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UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
AT    LOS  ANGELES 


FROM   THE   PORCH 


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FROM  THE  PORCH 


BY 

LADY   RITCHIE 


WITH    ILLUSTRATIONS 


SECOND   EDITION 


NEW    YORK 

CHARLES   SCRIBNER'S    SONS 

597-599  FIFTH   AVENUE 

1914 


Printed  by  Ballantyne,  Hanson  b'  Cc. 
At  the  Ballantyne  Tress,  Edinburgh 


35 


^ 


^ 


R  7 


DEDICATED 
TO   OUR   FRIEND 

RHODA   BROUGHTON 


Octoltr  1913 


JiJi6l87 


I  WISH  to  express  my  sincere  thanks  to  those 
Editors  who  have  allowed  me  to  reproduce 
these  scattered  papers  which  have  appeared 
at  long  intervals  in  the  Cornhill  Magazine, 
Macmillan's  Magardne,  the  Pall  Mall  Magazine, 
the  Contemporary  Reviexv,  the  Woman^s  World, 
the  Pilot,  and  the  Sphere  newspaper. 


CONTENTS 


DIVAGATIONS 

A  Discourse  on  Modern  Sibyls 
Charles  Dickens  as  I  remember  Him 
A  Dream  of  Kensington  Gardens     . 


3 
31 

46 


MONOGRAPHS 

Sainte  Jeanne  Francoisb  de  Chantal 
Quills  from  the  Swan  of  Lichfield 
Mrs.  John  Taylor,  of  Norwich 
L'Art  d'etre  Grandp^re    . 
Morland  at  Freshwater  Bay    . 
Alfred  Stevens  ..... 


61 
84 
135 
172 
198 
208 


Concerning     the 
Magazine"  . 
A  Meeting  in  a  Garden 
Upstairs  and  Downstairs 
In  My  Lady's  Chamber 


REMINISCENCES 

Founding     of     the     "  Cornhill 


227 
237 
244 
256 


vil 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


Portrait  of  Lady  Kitchie  at  the  Porch     .     Frontispiece 
From  a  photograph  taken  hy  Mrs.  Cameron  at 
Freshwater. 

The  Porch  .....  To  face  page  264 


DIVAGATIONS 


A   DISCOURSE   ON   MODERN   SIBYLS  ^ 

It  is  not  only  to  unite  teachers  and  to  improve 
teaching  that  the  EngHsh  Association  exists,  but 
also  to  give  in  some  measure  a  personal  expres- 
sion to  our  love  of  books,  to  the  thoughts  and 
impulses  which  come  from  their  infinite  combina- 
tions. 

Everything  is  to  be  found  in  book-lore  ;  not 
only  is  the  generous  feast  spread  out  for  favoured 
guests,  but  the  crumbs  are  there  falling  from  the 
high  tables.  There  is  fun,  there  is  fancy  and 
good-humour,  there  is  companionship  for  the 
solitary,  comfort  for  the  sad,  knowledge  of  life 
for  the  young,  and  for  the  elders  pleasant  gossip 
and  remembrance.  Professor  Ker  has  broucfht 
Romance  before  us  ;  Professor  Bradley  has  spoken 
of  Poetry  and  its  uses — who  that  was  present  on 
that  last  occasion  when  he  spoke  will  not  remember 

^  Tho  Presidontial  Address  delivered  at  the  Aunual  General 
Meeting  of  the  English  Association,  on  January  10,  1913.  It  was 
read  by  Mr.  Ernest  von  Glehn.  Copyright,  1913,  by  Lady  Ritchie, 
in  the  United  States  of  America. 

8 


4  FROM   THE   POECH 

it  ?  The  foggy  gloom  of  the  streets  invaded  the 
crowded,  attentive  room,  but  it  was  of  light,  and 
lovely  things,  the  lecturer  discoursed.  The  wide 
suggestions  appealed  to  those  who  could  follow 
them,  as  well  as  to  those  among  us  who  could 
not  always  follow  with  full  comprehension,  but 
who  appreciated  and  breathed  for  the  moment 
with  some  deeper  breath;  "living,"  as  Professor 
Bradley  said,  "  a  section  of  each  poet's  own  life  " 
in  the  passing  realisation  of  his  thought.  It  may 
seem  presumptuous  indeed  for  a  "  wren  with 
little  quill"  to  follow  such  discourses  with  mere 
personalities,  small  in  comparison  to  those  larger 
philosophies,  yet  a  literary  association  is  intended 
to  emphasize  and  give  voice  to  the  various  units 
which  compose  the  whole,  as  letters  are  part  of  a 
word,  words  form  the  sentence,  and  finally  the 
book  of  life  itself  is  spread  open. 

There  is  no  doubt  but  that  different  chapters 
of  Literature  commend  themselves  to  different 
generations.  A  well-known  critic,  an  American 
lady,  Miss  Fanny  Repplier,  also  taking  a  per- 
sonal standpoint,  deplores  the  misfortune  of 
having  been  herself  born  quite  a  century  too  late 
for  Success !     She  appeals  to  Evelina,  that  work 


A  DISCOUKSE  ON  MODERN  SIBYLS      5 

admired  by  Johnson  and  Burke  ;  she  points  to 
Hannah  More,  whose  tragedies  drew  tears  and 
praise  from  Garrick,  whose  tracts  reached  Mos- 
cow and  made  their  edifying  way  to  Iceland 
itself.  Tracts,  such  as  Charles  the  Footman 
and  the  Shepherd  of  Salishury  Plain,  are  also 
said  to  have  been  found  by  a  missionary  in  the 
library  of  the  Rajah  of  Tanjore.  "  Those  were 
the  days  to  live  in,"  cries  Miss  Repplier,  "  when 
families  tore  the  Mysteries  of  Udolpho  to  pieces 
in  their  eager  interest,  when  the  astounding  Miss 
Seward  dazzled  the  literary  world  ;  and  unfor- 
tunates, born  a  hundred  years  too  late,  may  look 
back  with  wistful  eyes  upon  an  age  which  they 
feel  themselves  qualified  to  have  adorned  !  " 

Some  time  ago,  borrowing  a  title  from  a  well- 
known  Elizabethan  collection  of  histories,  I  wrote 
a  little  volume  called  A  Book  of  Sibyls.  It  did 
not  concern  classical  beings,  with  flying  robes 
and  tripods,  uttering  incoherent  rhymes  and 
oracles  at  Delphi  and  elsewhere,  but  it  related 
to  certain  women  leading  notable  lives  in  mob- 
caps  and  hobble-skirts.  Jane  Austen,  then  as 
now,  was  supreme  among  them,  although  some 
sapient   critics  of  her  own  time  considered  her 


6  FROM   THE   PORCH 

"  commonplace,"  and  not  to  compare  to  the 
Edgeworths,  Barbaulds,  and  Opies  of  the  day. 
When  it  was  first  suggested  that  I  should 
speak  to  the  English  Association  of  yet  another 
generation  of  Sibyls  nearer  to  my  own  experi- 
ence, I  could  but  feel,  unlike  Miss  Repplier,  that 
I  had  been  fortunate  indeed  in  the  time  of  my 
birth.  I  do  not  know  whether  others  will  agree 
with  a  friend  of  mine  who  declares  that  people 
reach  their  complement  at  from  ten  to  twelve  years 
old,  and  that  they  never  really  change  after  that 
time,  though  they  may  learn  more  and  more  facts. 
As  the  years  go  by,  and,  alas,  the  hour  for  for- 
getting may  begin,  the  same  observer  still  exists 
throughout  the  different  stages.  Mrs.  Gaskell 
and  Mrs.  Oliphant  were  my  torch-bearers  in 
youth  as  afterwards.  The  Brontes  were  magi- 
cians, flashing  romance  into  the  little  Kensington 
street  in  which  we  dwelt.  George  Eliot  followed. 
I  do  not  here  attempt  to  speak  of  all  the  great 
masters  of  the  craft  then  living,  but  of  certain 
women  with  whom  I  have  had  the  privilege  of 
being  in  some  relation.  These  ladies  were  dressed 
not  in  flying  draperies  nor  in  mob-caps  and 
hobble-skirts,  but  in  crinolines — though  it  seems 


A  DISCOURSE  ON  MODERN  SIBYLS      7 

almost  desecration  to  mention  the  fact,  or  to 
suggest  that  George  Eliot  ever  wore  one.  They 
put  on  lop-eared  bonnets  when  they  went  abroad ; 
their  parasols  were  the  size  of  half-crowns  ;  they 
had  sandalled  shoes,  or  odd  flat  elastic  brodequins. 
Whatever  their  dress  may  have  been  in  1850,  they 
were  true  Sibyls  nevertheless.  Their  voices  were 
direct  and  outspoken,  they  went  straight  to  the 
heart  of  things.  When  I  made  their  acquaint- 
ance, I  myself  was  about  twelve  years  old  and 
forbidden  by  my  governess  to  read  novels.  No 
objection  was  made  to  the  works  of  Miss  Yonge^ 
personally  unknown  to  me  indeed,  but  neverthe- 
less a  sympathetic  confidante  and  playfellow.  I 
was  older  before  Miss  Braddon  wove  the  spells 
which  my  father  and  Dickens  both  so  warmly 
praised.  My  father  liked  Lady  Audley's  Secret ; 
Dickens  specially  cared  for  the  story  of  The 
Doctor's  Wife.  Many  other  Sibyls  were  yet  to 
be,  but  in  those  early  days  they  concerned  me 
not.  Rhoda  Broughton  was  in  her  schoolroom, 
Emily  Lawless  was  in  her  nursery,  Mrs.  Humphry 
Ward  in  her  cradle.  Mary  Cholmondeley  and 
Margaret  Woods  were  not  even  born  ;  not  to 
speak  of  how  many  others  besides,  happily  yet  to 


8  FROM   THE   PORCH 

be ;  poets,  historians,  essayists,  whose  names  will 
come  to  all  our  minds. 

My  governess  herself  gave  me  Mrs.  Oliphant's 
first  book  as  an  exception  to  the  rigid  rule 
against  novel-reading,  saying  she  heard  it  had 
been  written  by  a  girl  only  a  few  years  older 
than  I  was.  It  was  in  Scotch,  which  I  could 
not  understand,  but  it  was  a  novel  all  the  same. 
As  to  the  stern  edict  of  limitation,  fortunately 
for  me  Blackivood  was  not  a  novel,  but  a  sober- 
looking  magazine  with  a  brown-paper  cover  and 
a  picture  of  George  Buchanan,  surrounded  by 
thistles  ;  and  there  it  was  that  a  few  years  later 
I  found  the  Scenes  from  Clerical  Life,  all-absorb- 
ing, convincing,  written  as  I  imagined  by  one  of 
the  wisest  of  men.  I  used  to  try  to  picture  him 
to  myself,  grave  and  noble,  with  a  melancholy 
reserved  manner,  rather  bald — certainly  a  clergy- 
man from  Cambridge.  It  was  like  going  to  his 
church  to  read  of  Amos  and  Milly  Barton  and 
the  people  out  of  Janets  Repentance  and  Mr. 
GilfiVs  Love  St07y,  who  seemed  to  fill  our  house 
where  such  good  company  was  already  to  be  found. 
There  are  certain  Overtures,  like  that  one  to 
the  Freischutz,  which  in  the  opening  bars  bring 


A  DISCOURSE  ON  MODERN  SIBYLS      9 

before  us  all  the  coming  wonder  of  the  great 
music  yet  to  be.  In  the  same  way,  it  seems  now, 
looking  back,  that  when  I  wondered  over  the 
first  opening  chapters  of  George  Eliot's  work, 
all  the  suggestion  of  its  future  came  flooding  in. 
I  cannot  think  that  she  has  ever  given  us  any- 
thing more  beautiful  than  the  Scenes  from  Clerical 
Life,  as  they  dawned  then,  complete,  full  of  heart 
and  of  knowledge  —  knowledge  of  that  special 
phase  of  life  which  was  in  her  own  experience. 

The  very  first  sentences  of  Amos  Barton  open 
in  old  Shepperton  Church,  where  George  Eliot, 
as  a  child  herself,  is  waiting  in  her  place : 

"  As  the  moment  of  psalmody  approached,  by 
some  process  to  me  as  mysterious  and  untraceable 
as  the  opening  of  the  flowers  or  the  breaking-out 
of  the  stars,  a  slate  appeared  in  front  of  the  gal- 
lery, advertising  in  bold  characters  the  psalm 
about  to  be  sung."  Then  follows  the  description 
of  its  accompaniment,  "  the  bassoon,  the  two  key- 
bugles,  the  carpenter  understood  to  have  an 
amazing  power  of  singing  '  counter '  who  formed 
the  complement  of  the  choir  regarded  in  Shep- 
perton as  one  of  distinguished  attraction,  occa- 
sionally known   to  draw  hearers  from  the  next 


10  FROM   THE   PORCH 

parish.  .  .  .  The  greater  triumphs  were  reserved 
for  the  Sundays  when  the  slate  announced  an 
Anthem  .  .  .  when  the  key-bugles  always  ran 
away  at  a  great  pace,  while  the  bassoon 
every  now  and  then  boomed  a  flying  shot  after 
them.  .  .  ." 

Better  even  than  the  account  of  the  choir  is 
the  noble  sermon  the  author  speaks  in  conclusion, 
and  of  which  this  is  the  text : 

"  Blessed  influence  of  one  true  loving  human 
soul  on  another  !  Not  calculable  by  algebra,  not 
deducible  by  logic,  but  mysterious,  eflectual, 
mighty  as  the  hidden  process  by  which  the  tiny 
seed  is  quickened,  and  bursts  forth  into  tall  stem 
and  broad  leaf,  and  glowing  tasseled  flower. 
Ideas  are  often  poor  ghosts ;  our  sun-filled  eyes 
cannot  discern  them  ;  they  pass  athwart  us  in 
thin  vapour,  and  cannot  make  themselves  felt. 
But  sometimes  they  are  m^ade  fiesh ;  they  breathe 
upon  us  ivith  warm  breath,  they  touch  us  with 
soft  responsive  hands,  they  look  at  us  with  sad 
sincere  eyes,  and  speak  to  us  in  appealing  tones ; 
they  are  clothed  in  a  living  human  soul,  with 
all  its  conflicts,  its  faith  and  its  love.  Then  their 
presence  is  a  power,  then  they  shake  us  like  a 


A  DISCOURSE  ON  MODERN  SIBYLS     11 

passion,  and  we  are  drawn  after  them  with  gentle 
compulsion,  as  flame  is  drawn  to  flame." 

Some  one  asked  me  once  if  I  liked  books  or 
people  best.  It  is  an  impossible  question  to 
answer.  Books  are  people,  if  they  are  worth 
anything  at  all ;  just  as  people  at  times  become 
books,  and  are  often  all  the  better  for  the 
transmigration. 

I  once  had  a  talk  with  George  Eliot.  It  was 
in  winter  time  with  the  snow  lying  on  the  ground. 
She  sat  by  the  fire  in  a  beautiful  black  satin 
gown,  with  a  green-shaded  lamp  on  the  table 
beside  her,  where  I  saw  German  books  lying 
and  pamphlets  and  ivory  paper-cutters.  She  was 
very  quiet  and  noble,  with  two  steady  penetra- 
ting eyes  and  a  sweet  voice.  As  I  looked  I  felt 
her  to  be  a  friend,  not  exactly  a  personal  friend 
but  a  good  and  benevolent  impulse.  I  remember 
she  said  "  it  was  better  in  life  to  build  one's 
cottage  in  a  valley  so  as  to  face  the  worst  and 
not  to  fall  away ;  and  the  worst,"  she  continued, 
"  was  this  very  often,  that  people  were  living 
with  a  hidden  power  of  work  and  of  help  in  them 
which  they  could  not  apply,  which  they  scarcely 
estimated.     We  ought  to  respect  our  influence," 


12  FROM   THE   PORCH 

she  said.  "  We  know  by  our  own  experience 
how  very  much  others  affect  our  lives,  and  we 
must  remember  that  we  in  turn  must  have 
the  same  effect  upon  others." 

I  cannot  but  recall  at  the  same  time  what 
another  friend  once  told  me  of  George  Ehot's 
vivid  suffering  and  susceptibility  to  outer  in- 
fluences, to  criticism.  People  of  an  imaginative 
nature  buy  their  experience  dearly,  and  perhaps 
over-estimate  the  importance  of  the  opinions 
which  disturb  them.  Miss  Bronte  suffered  much 
in  the  same  way,  and  I  have  known  similar 
instances  even  among  literary  men.  At  the  time 
when  I  knew  George  Eliot  her  name  was  famous. 
Middlemarch  and  Daniel  Deronda  had  issued 
like  fertilising  tides,  lagging  sometimes,  then 
again  carrying  everything  along  with  them. 
She  had  written  that  noble  opening  chapter  to 
Bomola,  that  "  Proem,"  as  she  chooses  to  call 
it,  in  which  she  stands  upon  the  Ponte  Vecchio 
looking  over  Florence  and  evoking  its  past  and 
its  present,  and  describing  with  so  sure  a  touch 
"  the  little  children  in  the  old  city  making 
another  sunlight  amid  the  shadows  of  age." 

I   have   sometimes  tried   to  define   to  myself 


A  DISCOURSE  ON  MODERN  SIBYLS    13 

the  differences  between  the  great  women-writers 
of  my  youth.  George  Eliot  and  Mrs.  Oliphant 
seem  to  be  Rulers  in  their  different  kingdoms 
of  fancy ;  George  Eliot  watching  her  characters 
from  afar,  Mrs.  Oliphant  in  a  like  way  describing, 
but  never  seeming  subject  to,  the  thronging 
companies  she  evokes.  Mrs.  Gaskell,  on  the 
contrary,  became  the  people  she  wrote  about. 
When  she  wrote  of  Charlotte  Bronte,  for  instance, 
she  saw  with  her  eyes  and  imbibed  her  impres- 
sions. In  the  same  way  in  her  stories  she  seems 
inspired  by  each  character  in  turn,  whether  it  is 
Molly  Gibson  or  her  stepmother,  or  Miss  Matty 
and  Miss  Deborah,  or  shall  we  instance  Philip 
Hepburn  in  Sylvias  Lovers,  walking  along  the 
downs  in  the  darkness,  looking  towards  the  lights 
in  the  distant  valley  and  listening  to  the  clang 
of  the  New  Year  bells  ? 

Currer  Bell  wrote  some  years  before  George 
Eliot  began  to  publish.  There  is  an  amusing 
and  indignant  letter  addressed  to  George  Lewes 
in  1850,  when  Currer  Bell,  in  correspondence 
with  him,  complains  of  a  review  (in  the  Edin- 
burgh) he  had  written  of  her  work.  Some  one 
once  asked  Miss  Yonge  what  she  felt  when  the 


14  FROM  THE  PORCH 

reviewers  cut  her  up.  She  laughed,  and  said: 
"  Well,  I  don't  cry  all  day  long  as  Miss  Bronte 
does  when  she  reads  an  adverse  review."  But 
Miss  Bronte's  standard  is  quite  different  from 
Miss  Yonge's.i  For  her  everybody  struck  a 
note,  and  was  to  be  reckoned  with.  She  con- 
cludes her  letter  to  Lewes  in  these  words : 

"I  shake  hands  with  you,  you  have  excellent 
points,  you  can  be  generous.  I  still  feel  angry 
and  think  I  do  well  to  be  angry,  but  it  is  the 
anger  one  experiences  for  rough  play  rather  than 
foul  play.  I  am  yours  with  a  certain  respect  and 
more  chagrin,  Curker  Bell." 

Endless  histories  of  the  Brontes  have  been 
written  of  late,  but  the  stories  of  Jane  Eyre,  of 
Shirley,  of  Villette,  are  each  in  turn  biographies 
of  Charlotte  Bronte  and  of  her  sisters,  told  by 
her  with  that  passion  which  coloured  everything 
she  touched.     We   have   no  need  to  be   taught 

^  There  is  a  pretty  story  told  in  Mrs.  Romanes' it/e,  of  Charlotte 
Yonge  being  frightened  by  the  popularity  of  The  Heir  of  Redely ffe, 
and  going  to  consult  Keble,  fearing  her  own  undue  elation. 
"  Do  you  care  for  such  things  ?  "  said  kind  Keble  ;  and  then  he 
quoted  the  concluding  words  of  the  90th  Psalm  ;  "Prosper  Thou 
the  work  of  our  hands  upon  us,  O  prosper  Thou  our  handiwork." 


A  DISCOUESE  ON  MODEEN  SIBYLS    15 

to  admire  her.  She  was  a  Sibyl  indeed  with 
oracles  at  her  command.  She  flashed  her  inspira- 
tions upon  her  readers,  and  all  through  the  sad- 
ness of  her  life  and  its  surroundings  one  realises 
the  passionate  love  which  pervaded  it,  both  for 
the  people  who  belonged  to  her,  and  the  places 
and  things  to  which  she  belonged.'  She  was  a 
poet.  She  owned,  as  only  poets  can  own,  the 
world  all  round  about  her.  The  freehold  of  the 
fells  and  the  moors  was  hers,  and  of  the  great 
Yorkshire  vault  overhead ;  and  above  all  that 
eager  heart  was  hers,  throbbing  in  the  little 
frail  body. 

"If  you  knew,"  she  writes  to  a  friend,  "my 
thoughts,  the  dreams  that  absorb  me,  and  the 
fiery  imagination  that  at  times  eats  me  up,  you 
would  pity  and,  I  dare  say,  despise  me ;  but  I 
know  the  treasures  of  the  Bible,  I  love  them  and 
adore  them,  I  can  see  the  well  of  Life  in  all  its 
clearness,  but  when  I  stoop  down  to  drink,  the 
pure  waters  fly  from  my  Hps  as  if  I  were 
Tantalus." 

*  August  1913. — Some  letters  from  Miss  Bronte  to  M.  Heger 
recently  published  only  confirm  this  view  more  and  more.  It 
would  have  been  more  to  the  recipient's  credit  if  he  had  answered 
them  and  honourably  burnt  them,  instead  of  not  answering  and 
leaving  them  to  be  printed  in  the  Times. 


16  FROM  THE  PORCH 

No  more  spontaneous  honour  was  ever  offered 
by  one  woman  of  genius  to  another,  than  when 
Mrs.  Gaskell  wrote  the  life  of  Charlotte  Bronte. 
The  opening  of  the  book  is  very  remarkable ; 
the  wild  West  Riding  country  is  there,  the 
weather  is  there,  the  country  people  are  made 
to  talk — how  old  Tabby  lives  in  the  stone  Par- 
sonage along  with  the  Parson  and  his  wonderful 
children !  We  see  those  girls  growing  up  as 
time  goes  on,  growing  into  tiny  gigantic  women, 
so  timid,  so  strong,  for  whom  life  was  so  great 
a  matter,  who  thought  the  world  was  made  for 
them,  who  faced  death  with  such  calm  and 
courageous  dignity. 

Any  one  who  has  ever  studied  the  work  of  the 
Brontes  must  have  realised  that  gift  of  descrip- 
tion which  was  theirs.  I  remember  once  being 
in  Brussels,  having  lost  my  way,  when  I  came  to 
a  place  off  the  high  street  which  was  strangely 
familiar  to  me,  a  place  where  steps  led  from  the 
street  to  a  lower  level ;  and  there  stood  a  fine 
old  house  with  closed  doors  and  shutters,  and 
a  walled  garden,  and  summer  trees  overgrowing 
the  walls.  Surely  this  had  all  been  seen  before 
by  me,  and  I  had  an  odd  impression  of  a  figure 


A  DISCOUESE  ON  MODERN  SIBYLS    17 

flitting    from    the    doorway ;    then    I    suddenly 
recognised    the    house    in    Villette,   where    Lucy 
Snow  spent  that  long  and  lonely  summer  time. 
On  my  return  to  the  hotel  I  found  that  I  had 
not    been    mistaken.       Alas !    according    to    an 
article  published  not  long  ago  in  Blachivood,  the 
Pension   Heger  and   its   inhabitants  also  recog- 
nised the  pictures    in    Villette.      I    can  imagine 
the  interest  and    the  dissatisfaction    they  must 
have  given,   most  especially  to   the  mistress  of 
the   establishment.      The  writer   of  the   article, 
an  American  girl  who  had  herself  been  at  the 
school,  describes  all  that  M.  Heger  and  his  family 
told  her  of  their  admiration  and  respect  for  their 
pensionnaire,  and  their   dismay  when  they  dis- 
covered   the    impression    they    themselves    had 
made    upon    her.       For    years    afterwards,    by 
Madame's   decree,    no    English   pupils   were   re- 
ceived into  the  establishment ;   and  what  they 
subsequently   thought    of    the    American    girl's 
article  I  do  not  know. 

As  a  child  I  can  remember  Charlotte  Bronte 
talking  to  my  father  with  odd  inquiring  glances  ; 
as  a  girl  I  heard  of  her  from  her  friends  and 
admirers.     Only  the  other   day  a  characteristic 


18  FROM  THE  PORCH 

story  was  told  me  by  Mr.  Reginald  Smith. 
When  his  father-in-law,  Mr.  George  Smith, 
wished  to  have  Miss  Bronte's  portrait  done,  he 
applied  to  Mr.  George  Richmond,  the  great 
painter,  who  agreed  to  make  the  attempt,  but 
who  found  it  almost  impossible  to  catch  the 
likeness,  so  utterly  dull  and  unresponsive  was 
her  expression.  For  a  long  time  he  tried  in 
vain  to  interest  her  and  awaken  any  gleam  of 
life ;  at  last  by  chance  he  happened  to  mention 
that  he  had  seen  the  Duke  of  Wellington  the 
day  before.  Immediately  the  mask  came  to  life, 
the  light  flashed  forth,  and  all  was  well. 

Some  years  after  her  death  I  visited  the  shrine 
to  which  such  hundreds  of  pilgrims  have  climbed 
in  turn.  We  came  from  Keighley,  toiling  up 
the  steep  hill  at  some  hour  when  the  women 
were  leaving  their  work  at  the  mills,  and  the 
echo  of  their  wooden  clogs,  striking  upon  the 
stones,  followed  us  all  the  way.  We  reached 
Haworth  on  the  hill-top  with  its  scattered 
cottages  and  distant  wolds  and  the  grim, 
stately  church  uprearing  in  the  churchyard. 
We  stopped  at  the  doorway  of  the  inn,  of 
which  we  had  read  and  which  Branwell  Bronte 


A  DISCOUESE  ON  MODERN  SIBYLS    19 

frequented.  The  days  of  which  I  am  speaking 
are  so  long  ago  that  the  host  was  still  alive 
who  had  known  the  Brontes,  and  he  described 
how  Branwell  used  to  linger  in  the  bar  late  into 
the  night,  and  finally  be  sent  hurrying  home 
by  a  back  door  and  a  short  cross-road  that  leads 
to  the  parsonage.  We,  too,  followed  the  road, 
hoping  to  see  the  rooms  in  the  little  rectory 
where  the  great  visions  had  been  evoked  for  all 
the  world  to  wonder  at.  The  then  dwellers 
at  the  parsonage,  naturally  exasperated  by  an 
unending  stream  of  uninvited  visitors,  refused 
to  admit  us,  and,  this  being  so,  we  crossed  the 
adjacent  churchyard  and  came  to  the  church, 
where  a  pew-opener  showed  us  the  old  pew  and 
the  monuments,  and  we  heard  her  discoursing, 
somewhat  too  familiarly  I  thought,  of  those 
whose  dead  memories  still  outshine  the  living 
presences.  Nay,  the  very  creatures  of  their 
imaginations  still  seemed  more  alive  than  many 
of  us.  Who  shall  limit  the  life  of  visionary 
friends,  of  dream  children  after  the  dreamers 
are  gone  ? 

Just  as  archaeologists   trace    buried  cities,   so 
I  have  lately  heard  of  an   American  critic  who 


20  FROM   THE   PORCH 

has,  with  a  personally  conducted  party  of  com- 
patriots and  Norwegians  interested  in  books  and 
education,  followed  the  traces  of  Mrs.  Gaskell's 
advance  and  travelled  from  America  via  Norway 
to  Knutsford  in  Cheshire  to  see  the  actual  home 
of  Miss  Mattie  at  "  Cranford,"  so  as  to  be  able 
to  describe  it  to  the  classes  at  home. 

What  a  kind  gift  to  the  world  was  this 
"  Cranford,"  that  city  of  refuge !  Charlotte 
Bronte,  writing  to  Mrs.  Gaskell  in  1853,  says  of 
a  letter  :  "  It  was  as  pleasant  as  spring  showers, 
as  reviving  as  a  friend's  visit,  in  short,  very 
like  a  page  of  Cranfordr 

Cranford  is  no  heroic  school  of  life,  no  scene 
of  passion :  it  is  daily  bread,  it  is  merry  kind- 
ness. It  proves  the  value  of  little  things ;  it  is 
the  grain  of  mustard  seed  :  it  reveals  the  mighty 
secret  of  kindness  allied  to  gentle  fun.  Parson 
Primrose  would  have  been  at  home  there,  so 
would  Sir  Roger  de  Coverley  and  Colonel 
Newcome.  There  should  be  a  proposal  to  give 
the  freedom  of  the  city  to  certain  favoured 
heroes  and  heroines — we  might  each  select  them 
for  ourselves. 

I  have  quoted  elsewhere  the  description  given 


A  DISCOURSE  ON  MODERN  SIBYLS    21 

to  me  by  Mrs.  Murray  Smith,  when  I  asked  her 
what  she  remembered  of  Mrs,  Gaskell.  She 
answered  :  "  Many  have  written  of  her,  nobody 
has  ever  quite  expressed  her  as  she  was,  nor 
given  the  charm  of  her  presence,  the  interest  of 
all  she  said,  of  her  vivid  memory  and  delightful 
companionship." 

As  for  Charlotte  Bronte,  most  of  the  later 
happiness  of  her  life  came  from  Mrs,  Gaskell's 
protecting  element  of  common  sense  and  kindly 
friendship.  "  Do  we  not  all  know  that  true 
greatness  is  single,  oblivious  of  self  and  prone 
to  unselfish  unambitious  attachments  ? "  wrote 
the  author  of  Cranford.  Her  daughter,  speak- 
ing of  her  long  after,  once  exclaimed  this  was 
in  truth  her  mother — simple,  forgetting  her  own 
interests  in  trying  to  help  others. 

I  have  wished  in  this  little  address  to  recall 
these  four  well-known  Sibyls  of  my  early  youth 
—George  Eliot,  Mrs.  Gaskell,  Currer  Bell,  Mrs. 
Oliphant.  Of  all  these,  Mrs.  Oliphant's  life  is 
the  one  most  familiar  to  me,  and  with  my  re- 
membrance of  her  I  will  conclude.  Her  presence 
is  still  vivid  for  all  who  knew  her,  that  white- 


22  FEOM   THE   PORCH 

haired,  bright-eyed  lady,  sitting  in  her  sunny 
room  at  Windsor,  with  her  dogs  at  her  feet, 
with  flowers  round  about,  with  the  happy 
inroads  of  her  boys  and  their  friends,  with  girls 
making  the  place  merry  and  busy,  and  that  curious 
bodyguard  of  older  friends,  somewhat  jealous 
and  intolerant  of  any  affections  of  later  date 
than  their  own.  It  was  good  to  see  her  among 
them  all,  ever  serene  in  attention  and  interest, 
the  most  noteworthy  mistress  of  the  house, 
welcoming  courteously,  speaking  definitely  and 
to  the  point  with  her  pretty  racy  Scotch  accent 
and  soft  tones.  Her  work  was  never-ceasing, 
but  it  scarcely  seemed  to  interfere  with  her 
hospitable  life  among  her  associates. 

I  knew  her  abroad  as  well  as  at  home.  I  was 
once  staying  in  a  hotel  at  Grindelwald  with  the 
Leslie  Stephens.  Mrs.  Oliphant  and  her  young 
people  were  there  also,  and  our  parties  joined 
company.  We  used  to  dine  together,  walk 
together ;  I  used  to  see  her  at  her  daily  task, 
steadily  continuing,  notwithstanding  all  the 
interruptions  of  nature  and  human  nature — the 
changing  Hghts  on  the  mountains,  the  exclaiming 
of  youthful  excursionists,  the  many  temptations 


A  DISCOURSE  ON  MODERN  SIBYLS      23 

to  leave  her  task.  I  was  always  struck,  when 
I  saw  her  writing,  by  her  concentration  and  the 
perfect  neatness  of  her  arrangements — the  tiny 
inkstand  of  prepared  ink,  into  which  she  poured 
a  few  drops  of  water,  enough  for  each  day's 
work,  the  orderly  manuscript,  her  delicate,  fine 
pen.  .  .  .  When  she  had  finished,  she  would 
come  out  in  the  evening  for  a  saunter  along  the 
valley  with  Leslie  Stephen  and  the  rest  of  us. 
She  was  one  of  those  people  whose  presence  is 
even  more  than  a  pleasure,  it  was  a  stimulus ; 
she  was  kindly,  sympathetic,  and  yet  answering 
with  that  chord  of  intelligent  antagonism  which 
is  so  suggestive  and  makes  for  such  good  talk. 

She  used  to  tell  me  a  great  deal  of  her  past 
life  at  that  time,  but  with  a  certain  reserve  also, 
and  it  was  not  until  I  read  the  Autobiography 
published  after  her  death  that  I  realised  what 
her  great  cares  had  been.  I  could  then  under- 
stand why  she  had  been  so  scornful  of  mental 
difficulties  which  seemed  real  enough  to  some 
of  us,  and  why  she  always  spoke  bitterly  of 
problems  of  thought — she  who  had  so  many 
pra^ctical  troubles  to  encounter.  The  impression 
of  that  special  time  is  very  vivid  still — the  busy 


24  FROM   THE   POECH 

clatter  of  the  Swiss  village  close  at  hand,  the 
great  surrounding  mountains,  the  terrace  where 
we  used  to  sit  together  under  the  clematis  in 
full  flower,  and  her  eyes  shining  as  she  talked 
on  and  on.  I  remember  her  once  saying,  when 
I  exclaimed  at  something  she  told  me,  "  Tempera- 
ment has  a  great  deal  to  do  with  our  lives,  and 
mine  is  a  hopeful  temper  and  has  carried  me  on 
through  terrible  trials." 

Some  time  after  our  visit  to  Grindelwald,  I 
wrote  to  her  to  ask  for  a  literary  contribution 
for  a  friend,  an  editor  who  was  ill  and  in  great 
need  of  help.  Mrs.  Oliphant  immediately  sent 
a  story,  a  charming,  long,  cheerful  story,  which 
(as  I  discovered  later)  had  been  written  by  her 
son's  sick-bed,  and  which  she  gave  as  a  gift 
with  her  bountiful  hand  at  a  time  when  she 
hardly  knew  where  to  turn  for  money.  What 
friend  in  trouble  was  ever  dropped  or  ignored 
by  her?  When  her  helpless  brother  and  his 
children  came  appealing  to  her,  she  took  them 
all  into  her  home.  The  brother  died,  and  his 
fine  young  son  also'  died  just  at  the  opening  of 
the  career  in  which  Mrs.  Oliphant  had  started 
him,   but   the    delicate   girls   survived    to   repay 


A  DISCOUESE  ON  MODERN  SIBYLS      25 

with  full  measure  all  the  love  they  had  re- 
ceived. 

Mrs.  Oliphant  wrote  near  a  hundred  novels, 
we  are  told,  besides  her  admirable  criticisms  and 
her  histories,  besides  her  reviews,  and  the  lives 
of  Montalembert,  of  Irving,  and  of  Laurence 
Oliphant,  her  kinsman.  Her  books  of  travel 
about  Florence,  and  Venice,  and  the  Holy  Land 
represent  her  holidays ;  as  for  her  mystical 
histories,  they  always  seem  to  be  more  like 
herself  than  anything  else  ;  for  though  she  hated 
mental  speculation,  she  was  a  believing  mystic 
in  the  semblance  of  a  dignified  Scotch  lady,  a 
little  cold  in  manner  and  tart  in  speech.  Yet, 
as  is  the  way  with  some,  she  too  was  strangely 
moved  at  times  to  cast  away  all  concealment, 
and  to  pour  out  in  writing  those  heart-secrets, 
which  seem  spoken,  not  to  the  world,  but  to 
the  very  spirit  of  sympathy  which  is  in  the 
world,  when  the  pen  runs  on  almost  of  its  own 
accord  and  the  human  spirit  cries  aloud  from 
the  depths  of  silence. 

I  do  not  remember  to  have  read  anywhere 
else  a  description  more  to  the  point  than  that 
written  by  Mrs.  Oliphant,  towards  the  close  of 


26  FROM   THE   PORCH 

her  writing,  in  a  book  which  she  calls  The  Ways 
of  Life,  describing  "  the  ebb-tide  " — the  sudden 
realisation  that  all  advance  is  at  an  end.  .  .  . 
"It  is  a  very  startling  discovery,"  she  says,  "to 
one  who  has  perhaps  been  going  with  a  tolerably 
full  sail,  without  any  consciousness  of  weakened 
energies  or  failing  power,  and  it  usually  is  as 
sudden  as  it  is  strange,  though  probably  other 
people  have  already  found  it  out  and  traced 
the  steps  of  its  approach.  .  .  .  But  yet  the  ebb 
has  its  poetry  too,  though  the  colours  are  more 
sombre,  and  the  sentiment  is  different.  The 
flood,  which  in  its  rise  seemed  almost  individual, 
pervaded  by  something  like  conscious  life  or 
force,  becomes  an  abstract,  relentless  fate  when 
it  pours  back  into  the  deep  gulf  of  the  sea  of 
forgetfulness.  .  .   ." 

Mrs.  Oliphant  has  herself  criticised  her  own 
work — she  might  have  done  better,  she  says, 
if  she  had  written  much  less,  and  reached  a 
higher  level.  Fancy  was  hers  indeed,  intuitive 
grasp  of  circumstance :  only  the  very  bountiful- 
ness  of  her  gift  was  her  temptation.  "  Was  it 
love  of  mammon,"  she  asks,  "  which  impelled  me 
to  write  on,  or  love  of  my  children  ? "     Would 


A  DISCOURSE  ON  MODEEN  SIBYLS    27 

the  praise  of  the  critics  have  been  worth  the 
daily  happiness  of  all  those  who  depended  on  her 
toil  for  their  gaiety  and  superfluity,  those  for 
whom  she  so  gladly  slaved,  morning,  noon,  and 
late  into  the  night  ?  She  used  to  sit  up  at  her 
writing  after  every  one  was  gone  to  bed,  and 
rise  again  on  dark  winter  mornings  to  see  her 
boys  off  to  their  early  school.  At  times  she 
was  weary,  but  again  and  again  she  was  able 
to  resume  her  task  with  renewed  interest.  Too 
often  she  wrote  by  her  sons'  sick-beds,  in  appre- 
hension and  unspeakable  terror. 

No  one  has  spoken  more  truly  of  her  than  a 
friend  who  lived  after  her  for  a  time  in  the 
pleasant  Windsor  Crescent  house.  "It  is  good," 
says  Mrs.  Lionel  Cust,  "to  gather  up  again  some 
memories  of  that  vivid  and  charming  personality, 
of  that  brave,  indomitable  spirit,  of  that  amazing 
agility  which  could  rise  to  every  emergency  and 
every  crisis,  which  could  amuse  itself  with  the 
smallest  interests  or  penetrate  far  into  the  mists 
of  the  unseen." 

"  As  I  saw  her  in  the  last  years  of  her  life," 
Mrs.  Cust  continues,  "  she  was  old,  but  with  the 
dignity   of    a    queen,    and    shining    eyes   which 


28  FROM   THE   PORCH 

seemed  as  though  they  saw  far  into  the  distance. 
She  was  looking  towards  '  the  more  genial  land,' 
waiting  for  the  time  when  she  would  be  with 
those  again  whom  she  had  lost  here,  and  in  that 
steadfast  hope  she  died." 

"  The  one  good  thing  I  am  conscious  of,"  she 
wrote  to  her  friend  A.  K.  H.  B.,  "is  the  great, 
calm,  all-sustaining  sense  of  a  Divine  Unseen 
walking  in  the  cool  of  the  garden.  .  .  ." 

So  much  for  the  Torch-bearers  of  the  Early 
Victorian  days !  Not  very  long  ago  people 
spoke  of  the  rising  generation  knocking  at  the 
door ;  it  seems  now  as  if  already  the  rising 
generation  had  ceased  to  knock.  It  has  burst 
in,  leaving  the  doors  wide  open  to  admit  the 
draughts  from  outside,  and  the  shouts  and  shrieks 
and  the  storms  of  discord,  as  well  as  the  more 
harmonious  echoes  of  natural  life. 

The  impatient  effects,  the  incoherent  audacities 
of  the  post-present  taste  in  literature,  art,  and 
music,  appeal  to  an  entirely  different  set  of 
feelings  from  those  which  existed  in  my  own 
time. 

I   cannot   think   they   will   ever   impress   our 


A  DISCOUESE  ON  MODERN  SIBYLS    29 

children  as  our  familiar  visions  have  impressed 
us,  and  will  still  impress  those  who  are  yet  to 
live.  I  heard  of  a  great  leader  of  modern  ideas 
exclaiming  the  other  day,  "We  are  living  in 
the  present :  why  go  on  constantly  dwelling  on 
the  past?"  But  he  was  speaking  to  a  young 
woman  at  the  time,  and  an  old  one  might  have 
answered  him,  "  Because,  as  you  yourself  have 
sung  in  '  Lest  we  Forget,'  the  past  holds  us  in 
its  noble  grip  and  it  is  the  present." 

This  paper  was  written  far  from  home,  at 
Venice,  in  the  spring  of  1912,  in  a  window  of 
the  Palazzo  Barbaro,  that  benevolent  house  most 
beautiful,  where  so  many  of  us  have  been  received 
and  entertained  in  kindness.  From  its  windows, 
morning  after  morning,  one  might  watch  beneath 
the  pale  blue  heaven,  a  sweet  advancing  angel 
brightening  every  instant  in  annunciation  of  the 
day  to  come,  divinest  lights  changing  into  sun- 
shine, morning  clouds  trailing  towards  a  distant 
duomo,  while  doves  were  calling,  and  bells 
sounding  for  the  dawn. 

Just  opposite,  across  the  Grand  Canal,  stands 
another  palace,  also  with   carved  balconies  and 


30  FROM   THE   PORCH 

ancient  windows  and  sunlit  terraces.  This  palace 
belongs  to  a  lady  who,  loving  good  English 
and  beauty  of  style,  has  chosen  to  bestow  here 
in  London  a  yearly  prize  of  a  hundred  pieces  of 
gold,  to  be  won  in  fair  combat  by  literary 
aspirants,  young  knights  of  the  pen,  and  with 
this  pleasant  fact  I  am  glad  to  conclude  my  little 
discourse  about  writers. 


I 


CHARLES    DICKENS    AS    1 
REMEMBER    HIM 

Readers  of  my  father's  poems  will  remember 
those  charmmg  lines  "  Mrs.  Katherine's  Lantern," 
published  with  the  other  ballads.  The  lines  are 
so  well  known  I  need  scarcely  quote  them  again. 

To  K.  E. 

I  am  just  from  Hanway  Court, 
Where  the  Israelites  resort, 
And  this  lamp  I've  brought  with  me. 
Madam,  on  its  pane  you'll  see, 
The  initials  K.  and  E. 

Full  a  hundred  years  are  gone 
Since  the  little  beacon  shone 
On  a  Venice  balcony  ; 
There  on  summer  nights  it  hung, 
And  the  lovers  came  and  sung 
To  their  beautiful  K.  E. 

Hush !  in  the  canal  below 
Don't  you  hear  the  plash  of  I'ow'rs  ? 
Now  they  rest  upon  their  oars 
Underneath  the  lantern's  glow, 


32  FEOM   THE  PORCH 

And  a  thrilling  voice  begins, 
To  the  sound  of  mandolins, 
Begins  singing  of  amore 
And  delire  and  dolore, 
O  the  ravishing  tenore. 

Lady,  do  you  know  the  tune? 
Ah,  we  all  of  us  have  hummed  it ; 
I've  an  old  guitar  has  thrummed  it 
Under  many  a  changing  moon. 

Shall  I  try  it?     Do-Ee-Mi- 

What  is  this  ?     Ma  foi,  the  fact  is 

That  my  hand  is  out  of  practice, 

And  my  poor  old  fiddle  cracked  is ; 

And  a  man — I  let  the  truth  out — 

Who's  had  almost  every  tooth  out, 

Cannot  sing  as  once  he  sung, 

When  he  was  young  as  you  are  young. 

When  he  was  young  and  lutes  were  strung 

And  love  lamp  in  the  casement  hung. 

When  K.  E.  asked  me  the  other  day  what 
I  could  remember  of  her  own  father,  Charles 
Dickens,  whose  centenary  is  being  kept  this 
year,  I  answered  that  I  had  lived  all  my  life 
in  his  company,  but  I  could  almost  count  the 
occasions  of  actually  meeting  him  upon  my  fingers. 
And  yet,  as  I  have  said  elsewhere,  it  is  curious 
to  remember,  considering  how  rarely  we  met  and 
what  a  long  way  off  we  lived  from  one  another, 


CHARLES   DICKENS  33 

the  important  part  the  Dickens  household  seemed 
to  play  in  our  early  life.  The  little  girls  were 
just  about  our  own  ages  ;  K.  E.  and  my  sister 
were  the  same  age ;  Mary  Dickens,  whom  my 
father  also  liked  to  praise,  paired  off  with  me. 
The  Dickens  books  were  no  less  a  part  of  our 
home  than  our  father's  own  books.  Mr.  Pick- 
wick, Little  Nell,  Nicholas  Nickleby  and  the 
glorious  company  to  which  they  all  belonged, 
lived  with  us  no  less  than  did  Becky  and  Dobbin 
and  Major  Pendennis  and  the  beloved  inhabitants 
of  Fairoaks. 

I  have  a  letter  dated  Devonshire  Terrace, 
Sunday,  the  9th  of  January  1848,  which  I  am 
glad  to  have.  It  concerns  a  criticism  —  most 
probably  that  of  the  Christmas  Carol  which  my 
father  so  greatly  admired.  It  is  the  letter  of 
one  generous  young  man  to  another : 

"  My  dear  Thackeray,"  it  says,  "  I  need  not 
tell  you  that  I  have  been  delighted  and  cut 
tenderly  to  the  heart  by  your  generous  letter. 
You  would  never  have  written  it  if  you  had 
not  known  how  truly  and  heartily  I  should 
feel  it.  I  will  only  say  that  the  spirit  in  wliich 
I  read  it  was  worthy  of  the  spirit  in  which  you 


34  FROM   THE   PORCH 

wrote  it,  and  that  I  believe  there  is  nothing  in 
the  world,  or  out  of  it,  to  which  I  am  so  sensitive 
as  the  least  mark  of  such  a  manly  and  gallant 
regard. 

"...  I  am  saving  up  the  perusal  of  Vanity 
Fair  until  I  shall  have  done  Bomhey.  Believe 
me,  my  dear  fellow,  I  am  very  proud  of  your 
letter,  and  very  happy  in  its  receipt.  If  I  were 
to  pursue  the  subject  I  should  come  out  in  a 
style  which  would  be  full  of  all  sorts  of  faults 
but  insincerity." 

The  first  occasion  of  my  meeting  Mr.  Dickens 
was  at  the  house  of  Charles  Leslie,  a  painter  for 
whom  my  father  had  a  great  sympathy  and  affec- 
tion, and  of  whom  there  is  a  charming  life  by 
Tom  Taylor.  On  December  31st,  1841,  Leslie 
writes  to  Washington  Irving  in  America :  "  Mr. 
Dickens  tells  me  you  urged  him  to  become 
acquainted  with  me,  for  which  I  now  send  you, 
by  him,  my  thanks,  and  every  good  wish  of  this 
wishing  season."  And  it  was  accordingly  at 
the  Leslies'  home  some  ten  years  later  that  my 
sister  and  I  first  realised  Mr.  Dickens  himself, 
though  only  as  a  sort  of  brilliance  in  the 
room,  mysteriously  dominant  and  formless,       I 


CHAELES   DICKENS  35 

remember   how   everybody  lighted  up  when  he 
entered. 

In  this  same  Life  of  Charles  Leslie  there  is 
also  frequent  mention  of  a  certain  Captain  Mor- 
gan, of  whom  Leslie  says,  "  It  was  worth  going 
to  America  if  only  to  make  Captain  Morgan's 
acquaintance."  This  benevolent  seaman  used  to 
come  and  go  across  the  Atlantic  bestowing  friend- 
ship, barrels  of  red  apples  and  American  rocking- 
chairs  upon  his  sympathetic  English  companions, 
all  of  whom  he  delighted  to  make  happy :  we 
certainly  came  in  for  our  share.  My  impression 
is  that  on  this  particular  occasion  a  great  expedi- 
tion to  a  ship  in  some  far  distant  dock  had  been 
organised,  to  which  expedition  we  children  were 
admitted  at  my  father's  request.  Captain  Morgan 
must  have  been  on  board  his  ship,  and  Mr.  Dickens 
seemed  to  take  command  of  the  party  which 
started  from  the  Leslies'  house.  He  was  talking, 
arranging  everything,  in  spirits  gaily  delightful 
— as  I  have  said,  mysteriously  dominant.  All 
comes  back  to  my  mind  as  I  think  of  it,  and  I 
remember  (after  forgetting  a  great  deal)  that 
we  travelled  back  in  a  railway  carriage  in  Mr. 
Dickens's   company    late    at    night,    dead    tired, 


36  FROM  THE   PORCH 

enchanted,    sleepy,   yet   somehow   carried   along 
by  his  kindly  brilliance. 

It  was  soon  after  this  that  we  went  to  some 
eventful  children's  parties  in  Devonshire  Place, 
and  also  later  to  Tavistock  House,  and  then 
came  a  year  when  my  father  was  in  America 
and  we  were  living  with  our  grandparents  on 
one  side  of  the  Avenue  des  Champs  Elysdes, 
while  the  Dickens  party  was  across  the  road  in  a 
little,  low,  old  house  with  many  windows  looking 
out  upon  the  flowing  thoroughfare.  As  I  look 
in  the  collection  of  the  letters  of  Charles  Dickens, 
published  in  1879  by  his  daughter  and  his  sister- 
in-law,  I  find  more  than  one  letter  written  from 
49  Champs  Ely  sees,  swept  away  long  since. 
One  is  addressed  to  Mr.  W.  H.  Wills,  and  is 
dated  October  21st,   1855  :— 

"  I  have  two  floors  here,  entresol  and  first,  in 
a  doll's  house,  and  the  view  without,  astounding 
as  you  will  say  when  you  come.  The  house  is 
on  the  exposition  side  about  half  a  quarter  of 
a  mile  above  Franconi,  each  room  has  but  one 
window,  but  we  have  no  fewer  than  6  rooms 
(besides  the  back  ones),  looking  on  the  Champs 
Elysees,    with    the    wonderful    life    perpetually 


CHARLES   DICKENS  37 

flowing  up  and  down  .  .  .  damage  for  the  whole, 
700  francs  a  month ;  but,  sir,  when  Georgina, 
the  servants,  and  I  were  here  for  the  first  night, 
Catherine  and  the  rest  being  at  Boulogne,  I 
heard  Georgie  restless,  turned  out,  asked  what's 
the  matter  ?  *  Oh,  it's  dreadfully  dirty,  I  can't 
sleep  for  the  smell  of  my  room.'  Imagine  all  my 
stage- managerial  energies  multiplied  at  daybreak 
by  a  thousand  ;  imagine  the  porter,  the  porter's 
wife,  the  porter's  wife's  sister,  a  feeble  upholsterer 
of  enormous  age  from  round  the  corner,  and  all 
his  workmen  (4  boys)  summonded.  Imagine  the 
partners  in  the  proprietorship  of  the  apartment, 
and  a  martial  little  man  with  Franco-Prussian 
beard  also  summonded  ;  imagine  your  inimitable 
chief  briefly  explaining  that  dirt  is  not  in  his 
way,  and  that  he  is  driven  to  madness,  and 
that  he  devotes  himself  to  no  coat  and  a  dirty 
face,  until  the  apartment  is  thoroughly  purified. 
Imagine  co-proprietors,  at  first  astounded,  then 
wavering,  then  affected,  then  confiding  their 
utmost  private  sorrows  to  the  Inimitable,  offering 
new  carpets  (accepted),  embraces  (not  accepted), 
and  really  responding  like  French  bricks.  Sallow, 
unbrushed,  unshorn,  awful,  stalks  the  Inimitable 


L'2e;iH 


y^f 


38  FROM  THE  POKCH 

through  the  apartment  until  last  night.  Then 
all  the  improvements  were  concluded  !  You  must 
picture  it  as  the  smallest  place  you  ever  saw, 
but  as  exquisitely  cheerful  and  vivacious,  clean 
as  anything  human  can  be,  and  with  a  moving 
panorama  always  outside  which  is  Paris  in 
itself." 

My  sister  and  I  used  to  go  there  from  time  to 
time ;  celebrities  and  amusing  people  seemed 
always  coming  up  and  down  the  narrow  stairs. 
Robert  Lord  Lytton  I  remember,  Wilkie  Collins, 
and  many  more  with  whom  we  had  little  to  do, 
being  at  that  time  absorbed  by  our  youth  and 
our  lessons. 

In  the  collected  letters  there  is  a  letter  to 
Macready,  dated  from  Folkestone  on  the  4th 
October   1855  : 

"My  dearest  Macready, — I  have  been 
hammering  away  in  that  strenuous  manner  at 
my  book,  that  I  have  had  leisure  for  scarcely 
any  letters  but  such  as  I  have  been  obliged  to 
write,  having  a  horrible  temptation  when  I  lay 
down  my  book  pen  to  run  out  on  the  breezy 
downs,  tear  up  the  hills,  slide  down  the  same, 
and   conduct   myself  in    a   frenzied    manner   for 


CHARLES   DICKENS  39 

the  relief  that  only  exercise  gives  me.  .  .  .  Pray 
stick  to  that  dim  notion  you  have  of  coming  to 
Paris ;  how  delightful  it  would  be  to  see  your 
aged  countenance  in  that  capital !  It  will  renew 
your  youth  to  visit  a  theatre,  previously  dining 
at  the  Trois  Freres  in  company  with  the  jocund 
boy  who  now  addresses  you.  Do,  do  stick  to  it." 
One  day,  I  specially  remember,  when  we  had 
come  to  settle  about  a  drawing  class  with  our 
young  companion  K.  E.  (who  had  already  found 
out  what  she  liked  doing),  her  father  came  into 
the  room  accompanied  by  a  dignified  person — 
too  dignified  we  thought — who  came  forward 
and  made  some  solemn  remark,  such  as  Hamlet 
himself  might  have  addressed  to  Yorick,  and 
then  stood  in  an  attitude  in  the  middle  of  the 
room.  The  Paris  springtime  was  at  its  height, 
there  was  music  outside,  a  horse  champing  in 
the  road,  voices  through  the  open  window, 
and  Mr.  Macready,  for  it  was  he,  tragic  in 
attitude  gravely  awaiting  an  answer.  Mr. 
Dickens  seemed  to  have  instantly  seized  the 
incongruity,  suddenly  responding  with  another 
attitude,  and  another  oration  in  the  Hamlet 
manner,   so  drolly  and  gravely,  that  Macready 


40  FROM  THE  PORCH 

himself  could  not  help  smiling  at  the  burlesque. 
My  sister  and  I  had  come  to  settle  with  K.  E. 
about  a  master  recommended  by  Ary  Scheffer. 
After  Mr.  Dickens  and  Mr.  Macready  had  driven 
off  again,  all  our  plans  were  arranged  satis- 
factorily, and  for  a  time  we  used  to  meet  con- 
stantly and  to  draw  of  mornings.  The  master 
Ary  Scheffer  had  recommended,  looked  not  unlike 
one  of  Scheffer's  own  designs,  St.  Augustine  or 
another,  with  a  touch  of  Gandish.  He  taught 
us  to  do  gigantic  ears  and  classic  profiles ;  he 
was  never  tired  of  talking  and  of  praising 
Mr.  Ary  Scheffer,  and  also  in  particular  one  of 
his  present  pupils.  On  one  occasion  we  all  ad- 
journed to  Ary  Scheffer's  actual  studio  to  hear 
Mr.  Dickens  read ;  but  I  was  wool-gathering  in 
those  days ;  life  was  too  brimful  of  everything ; 
I  looked  about  at  the  pictures,  I  watched  the 
company,  I  admired  chivalrous  Ary  Scheffer's 
military  strides ;  I  wondered  to  see  our  drawing 
master,  whom  I  had  imagined  so  all-important, 
trying  in  vain  to  get  into  the  room  through  a 
doorway  (as  he  knew  no  English  his  presence 
did  not  greatly  matter),  but  meanwhile,  alas ! 
I  carried   away  little   of  the   reading  itself,  so 


CHARLES   DICKENS  41 

engrossed  was  I  with  the  fact  and  the  scene 
of  it  all.  I  am  interested  now,  when  I  turn 
to  the  Biographic  Generale,  hoping  to  find  some 
date  for  these  vague  reminiscences,  to  see  how 
the  great  author  was  made  welcome  in  Paris,  and 
credited  with  his  well-established  position,  and 
also  with  the  mention  of  various  ingenious  books 
I  had  never  heard  of  before.  The  Cricket  on  the 
Earth  is  one  of  them,  Chuzzlevil  is  another,  and 
to  all  this  the  critic  also  adds  a  sententious  little 
moral :  "  He  puts  into  practice  the  principles  of 
philanthropy  inculcated  in  his  works." 

Dickens  himself  has  written  of  his  pleasure 
in  the  recognition  he  met  with  at  this  time : 

"  You  cannot  think  how  pleasant  it  is  to  me 
to  find  myself  generally  known  and  liked  here. 
If  I  go  into  a  shop  to  buy  anything,  and 
give  my  card,  the  officiating  priest  or  priestess 
Vjrightens  up,  and  says,  '  Ah,  c'est  I'ecrivain 
celebre ;  Monsieur  porte  un  nom  tres  distingue  ; 
je  suis  honorr  de  voir  M.  Dickon ;  je  lis  un 
des  livres  de  Monsieur  tons  les  jours.' "  (In  the 
MonitPMr.) 

Then  he  describes  a  man  bringing  some  little 
vases,  which  he  unpacked,  and  talking  enthusi- 


42  FROM   THE  PORCH 

astically  about  Madame  Tojare  (Todgers),  "  Elle 
est  precisement  comme  uiie  dame  que  je  connais 
^  Calais." 

I  remember  Mr.  Dickens,  one  day  long  after 
those  early  times,  when  we  were  all  in  London 
again,  and  our  friend  K.  E.  lay  dangerously  ill 
of  a  fever  in  an  old  house  in  Sloane  Street. 
We  had  gone  to  ask  for  news  of  her.  It  was 
an  old  house,  panelled,  and  with  a  big  well 
staircase,  on  a  landing  of  which  we  met  Mr. 
Dickens  coming  away  from  the  sick-room.  He 
was  standing  by  a  window,  and  he  stopped  us 
as  we  were  going  up.  K.  E.  has  told  me  since 
then  that  in  those  miserable  days  his  very 
coming  seemed  to  bring  healing  and  peace  to  her 
as  she  lay,  and  to  quiet  the  raging  fever.  He 
knew  how  critical  it  was,  but  he  spoke  quietly 
and  with  good  courage — that  curious  life-giving 
power  of  his  struck  me  then  no  less  than  always 
before.  "When  she  is  better,"  he  said,  "we 
must  carry  her  off  to  her  old  home  in  the 
country  to  recover."  And  then  he  asked  us  with 
great  kindness  to  come  and  to  stay  with  him 
at  Gad's  Hill,  where  he  was  living  at  the  time. 


CHARLES   DICKENS  43 

There  is  one  other  meeting,  a  very  memorable 
one,  which  I  should  like  to  note  here,  even 
though  I  cannot  quite  place  it  with  its  date 
and  its  time.  About  eighteen  months  after  my 
father's  death  this  same  K.  E.  said  suddenly 
one  day  to  my  sister  and  myself,  "  I  know  you 
will  shrink  from  it,  but  I  want  to  take  you  to 
the  reading  of  Copperjleld  in  St.  James's  Hall. 
It  is  the  last  London  reading.  I  have  your 
places ;  I  asked  for  them  to  be  kept  for  you." 
She  was  so  affectionately  insistent  that  we  could 
not  help  agreeing,  for  she  spoke  with  the  true 
friend's  voice,  and  looked  with  eyes  that  com- 
pelled us.  I  have  always  been  glad  to  think 
that  we  went  with  her  on  that  occasion.  As 
I  have  said,  I  had  only  once  before  heard 
Mr.  Dickens  read — on  that  wasted  occasion  in 
the  Paris  studio,  but  on  this  special  evening 
in-  London,  it  was  for  all  the  rest  of  my  life 
that  I  heard  his  voice.  We  sat  in  the  front,  a 
little  to  the  right  of  the  platform ;  the  great 
Hall  was  somewhat  dimly  lighted,  considering  the 
crowds  assembled  there.  The  slight  figure  (so 
he  appeared  to  me)  stood  alone  quietly  facing 
the  long  rows  of  people.      He  seemed   holding 


44  FHOM  THE  POUCH 

the  great  audience  in  some  mysterious  way  from 
the  empty  stage.  Quite  immediately  the  story 
began :  Copperfield  and  Steerforth,  Yarmouth 
and  the  fishermen  and  Peggotty,  and  then  the 
rising  storm,  all  was  there  before  us.  .  .  .  It 
was  not  acting,  it  was  not  music,  nor  harmony 
of  sound  and  colour,  and  yet  I  still  have  an 
impression  of  all  these  things  as  I  think  of  that 
occasion.  The  lights  shone  from  the  fisherman's 
home ;  then  after  laughter  terror  fell,  the  storm 
rose ;  finally,  we  all  were  breathlessly  watching 
from  the  shore,  and  (this  I  remember  most 
vividly  of  all)  a  great  wave  seemed  to  fall 
splashing  on  to  the  platform  from  overhead, 
carrying  away  everything  before  it,  and  the 
boat  and  the  figure  of  Steerforth  in  his  red 
sailor's  cap  fighting  for  his  life  by  the  mast. 
Some  one  called  out ;  was  it  Mr.  Dickens  him- 
self who  threw  up  his  arm  ?  ...  It  was  all 
over,  we  were  half-laughing,  half-crying  with 
excitement ;  being  at  that  special  time  still 
very  much  wrought  up,  remembering  the  past, 
naturally  our  emotions  took  shape. 

"  I    was   determined    you    should    hear    him," 
said  our  friend  Kate.     "  Come  quick  before  any- 


45  CHARLES   DICKENS 

body  else  and  speak  to  him."  And  before  we 
had  recovered — it  almost  seemed  as  if  we  were 
still  in  the  storm  on  the  shore — she  had  drawn 
us  into  the  room  at  the  back  of  the  stage,  and 
we  found  ourselves  standing  before  Mr.  Dickens 
himself,  alone  again,  the  visions  had  vanished, 
and  he  was  holding  our  hands  with  warmest, 
kindest  grasp  of  greeting  and  comfort. 


A    DREAM    OF    KENSINGTON 
GARDENS 

FOR   MY  GRANDCHILDREN 

As  the  writer  walked  across  the  beautiful  illumi- 
nated Kensington  Gardens  on  a  September  morn- 
ing not  very  long  ago,  she  could  not  but  contrast 
what  she  remembered  with  what  she  then  beheld. 
Perhaps  one  of  the  few  privileges  of  advancing 
years  is  the  power  of  seeing  the  past  and  the 
present  at  the  same  time,  and  it  may  be  perceiv- 
ing each  more  clearly  from  such  a  contrasting 
standard.  My  present  was  certainly  a  very 
delightful  one.  A  flood  of  light  was  pouring 
over  the  gardens,  a  thousand  children  were  out 
in  the  sunshine — infants  who  could  run,  and  those 
who  were  carried  still  —  some  clustering  round 
the  pond,  others  at  their  play  under  the  trees. 
As  far  as  I  could  see  were  the  figures  of  happy 
companies.  One  flower-garden  led  to  another ; 
the  ga.rdeners  were  at  work  in  the  parterres 
belonging  to  the  old  Palace. 


DREAM  OF  KENSINGTON  GARDENS  47 

In  my  youth  Kensington  Palace  was  closed 
to  the  public,  but  to-day  a  straggling  stream 
of  visitors  went  drifting  from  the  Broad  Walk 
to  those  open  hospitable  doors  beyond  which 
Queen  Caroline's  old  panelled  staircase  leads 
into  her  gallery ;  leads  from  to-day  into  the 
times  when  the  charming  Queen  ruled  from  the 
quaint  old  Court.  There  is  her  picture  still 
hanging  from  the  walls  of  the  low  gallery  with  its 
south  windows,  there  is  another  of  King  George  II 
also  to  be  seen  alongside  the  careful  oil  portrait 
representing  the  dignified  and  beautiful  lady. 
A  friend  of  mine  who  was  lately  visiting  the 
pretty  old  Palace  told  me  that,  as  she  and  her 
husband,  Sir  William  R.  A.  (shall  we  call  him  ?), 
were  standing  there  and  looking  about  them, 
a  side  door  opened  in  one  of  the  rooms,  and  from 
it  issued  another  stately  and  charming  lady  of 
to-day — a  descendant  of  Queen  Caroline,  a  Prin- 
cess whose  home  is  also  in  Kensington  Palace. 
She  recognised  my  friends,  and  smiled  and  said, 
"  I  will  show  you  what  is  to  be  seen  ;  I  have 
known  it  all  my  life." 

We  of  my  own  generation,  as  children,  used 
to  play  round  about  the  old  Palace,     No  doors 


48  FROM   THE   PORCH 

were  opened  to  us,  nor  did  gracious  Princesses 
appear  to  act  as  cicerones,  but  we  knew  the 
doorways  and  the  gables  and  the  quaint  corners 
from  without :  the  old  steps  and  narrow  passages. 
Specially  beloved  by  us  was  the  beautiful  Ban- 
queting Hall,  packed  full  of  orange  trees  in  those 
long-ago  days.  There  are  four  niches  in  the 
wall  outside  along  the  terrace,  and  our  absurd 
delight  was  once  to  stand  motionless  in  the  niches, 
with  some  faint  hope  that  the  passers-by  might 
suppose  us  to  be  real  statues.  When  a  timid 
old  country  lady  came  up  to  me  the  other  day 
and  asked  me  what  was  the  fine  building  I  was 
looking  at,  and  whether  she  might  enter,  I 
was  thinking  with  amusement  of  certain  happy 
moments  I  had  passed  in  each  successive  niche 
in  turn.  Which  of  my  old  friends,  I  wonder, 
most  potent,  grey-haired  signoras,  will  remember 
them  also? 

Leigh  Hunt  recalls  the  picturesque  figures  in 
hoops  and  patches  who  frequented  Kensington 
Gardens — the  Court  processions  following  the 
first  two  Georges  and  their  attendants  —  the 
politicians   in   knee-breech es,    and   buckles,    and 


DREAM  OF  KENSINGTON  GARDENS     49 

powdered  queues.  He  loves  to  go  back  to 
the  days  when,  according  to  Horace  Walpole, 
the  Session  in  Parliament  consisted  chiefly  of 
a  dialogue  between  Pitt  and  Fox.  He  peoples 
Kensington  once  more,  brings  back  the  Duchesse 
de  Mazarin  in  all  her  wonderful  beauty  at  forty- 
five  years  of  age,  with  her  black  Italian  hair, 
walking  along  Kensington  Square,  and  Talleyrand 
dwelling  in  that  corner  house  which  till  lately 
rang  with  sweetest  music  evoked  by  dear  muses 
of  the  present.  He  awakens  the  shades  of  Ken- 
sington Gore  and  its  inhabitants — Wilkes  issues 
forth  from  the  house  which  once  had  the  Grecian 
urn  over  the  doorway ;  Wilberforce  starts  re- 
peating the  Hundred  and  Nineteenth  Psalm  verse 
by  verse,  as  he  paces  the  path  from  his  home  to 
Hyde  Park  Corner.  But  the  urn  is  gone,  and 
the  ashes  of  the  past  scattered  before  the  advance 
of  time,  the  din  of  motors,  and  the  pandemonium 
of  progress  which  existed  not  in  those  days ; 
Wilberforce  himself  could  scarcely  have  finished 
his  Psalm  in  peace  had  he  only  lived  to-day. 
More  than  one  generation,  even  nobler  than  that 
of  which  Leigh  Hunt  has  written,  divides  us 
from  them   all,   more  than   one   generation   has 


50  FROM   THE   PORCH 

enjoyed  the  pleasant  space  and  fresh  air,  and 
listened  in  turn  to  the  birds  singing  in  the  great 
sylvan  playground. 

Browning  loved  the  place,  and  used  to  sit 
there  of  a  morning  under  the  trees.  I  can 
remember  my  father  greeting  him  one  day,  as 
the  poet  advanced  towards  us  striding  along 
the  broad  path  that  leads  from  the  Bayswater 
Road.  Day  after  day  gallant  Sir  Thomas  Trou- 
bridge,  who  was  wounded  at  Alma,  used  to  pass, 
gaily  active  on  his  crutches.  How  often  have 
I  seen  Carlyle  there  walking  on  and  on,  "  writing 
his  footsteps  along  the  ways  of  life."  One  special 
April  morning,  rainy  and  delicious,  comes  to  my 
mind  at  this  minute.  He  nodded  to  us  as  we 
caught  him  up,  waited  for  us  a  minute,  and 
then,  as  we  followed  in  his  wake,  passed  on  by 
the  Palace  and  round  by  the  old  Banqueting 
House,  soft  showers  falling  through  the  sunshine 
all  the  way. 

One  hot  summer-time  long  ago  the  Tennysons 
lived  in  Kensington  Gore.  They  seemed  to  us 
to  make  London  into  a  country  place,  so  asso- 
ciated did  the  poet  and  his  home  appear  to  be 
with  Freshwater  and  its  open  downs ;  their  boys 


DREAM  OF  KENSINGTON  GARDENS  51 

used  to  go  galloping  along  the  Kensington  High 
Road  on  their  ponies  as  if  they  were  at  home. 
Tennyson,  in  his  cloak  and  hat,  took  long  daily 
walks  into  London.  It  was  still  possible  then 
to  walk,  to  converse  as  you  walked,  to  think 
of  something  besides  the  crossings. 

It  would  be  endless  to  try  to  enumerate  the 
names  which  are  written  on  the  old  trees  of 
Kensington  Gardens,  but  I  should  like  to  say 
something  of  the  playfellows  of  my  youth  ;  of 
the  ducks  in  the  Round  Pond  ;  of  the  memory 
of  a  certain  grey  goose,  the  terror  of  our  child- 
hood, before  whom  I  and  my  contemporaries 
used  to  fly  when  we  went  to  feed  the  waterfowl. 
There  was  a  legend  that  this  savage,  hungry 
goose  had  broken  a  little  boy's  leg,  so  dissatisfied 
was  he  with  the  piece  of  bread  which  had  been 
thrown  to  him.  Besides  this  ferocious  bird,  there 
were  others  in  great  numbers,  and  among  them 
two  charming  little  ducks,  my  father's  special 
favourites.  They  had  bright  eyes  and  coloured 
faces  and  ornamental  crests ;  they  seemed  to  be 
of  Chinese  origin. 

As  I  walked  only  yesterday,  I  had  not  much 
time  to  spare  for  the  ducks  of  to-day,  though  1 


52  FROM   THE   PORCH 

gave  them  a  passing  friendly  glance  for  the  sake 
of  old  times.  I  came  home  to  resume  my  study 
of  Leigh  Hunt's  two  volumes,  where  I  read  of 
the  possibilities  which  have  been,  as  well  as  the 
facts  which  are. 

Among  others,  Voltaire  had  many  links  with 
the  Court  of  George  II  during  his  stay  in  Eng- 
land, and  Queen  Caroline  was  one  of  his  special 
patrons.  Leigh  Hunt  suggests  that  Watteau,  as 
well  as  Voltaire,  must  have  known  Kensington 
Gardens — "  Watteau,  the  glorifier  of  gardens  par 
excellence;  that  is  to  say,  of  well-bred  groves 
and  glades,  where  the  trimmer  had  been  with 
his  shears,  and  ladies  and  gentlemen  assembled 
to  play  at  shepherd  and  shepherdess  in  silk  and 
embroidery." 

The  age  of  Watteau  is  long  over,  but  as  I 
enjoyed  my  morning's  stroll,  surely  I  seemed 
to  have  seen  certain  fanciful,  dignified  figures 
advancing,  with  all  the  graceful  progression  of 
the  past ;  plumes  waved,  light  scarves  floated 
in  the  air,  charming  presences  seemed  to  meet 
me  from  every  point,  from  every  century.  .  .  . 
Was  it  a  waking  vision  or  a  dream  ? 

Before  I  quite  wake  up  I  cannot  help  quoting 


1 


BREAM  OF  KENSINGTON  Gx\RDENS    53 

a  few  passages  from  Walford's  Kensingtoyi,  who 
tells  us  that  Lady  Brownlow  describes  meeting 
Madame  Recamier  in  Kensington  Gardens.  She 
appeared  dressed  a  V antique,  a  muslin  gown  cling- 
ing to  her  form  like  the  folds  of  drapery  on  a 
statue.  Her  hair  was  in  a  plait  at  the  back  and 
falling  in  small  ringlets  round  her  face  and  greasy 
with  huile  antique ;  a  large  veil  thrown  over  her 
head  completed  her  attire,  which  not  unnaturally 
caused  her  to  be  followed  and  stared  at.  Wal- 
ford  also  quotes  from  the  Historical  Recollections 
of  Thomas  Smith  that  Mrs.  Sarah  Grey  had  a 
pension  granted  to  her  of  £18  a  year,  a  com- 
pensation for  the  death  of  her  husband,  acci- 
dentally shot  by  a  keeper  while  hunting  a  fox 
in  Kensington  Gardens. 

King  William  Ill's  taste  lay  all  in  sternest 
clippings  and  rulings,  and  fortifications  of  yew. 
More  smiling  fancies  followed  in  Queen  Anne's 
reign. 

Addison  has  mentioned  Kensington  Gardens 
— how  often  he  must  have  passed  by  on  his  way 
from  Holland  House  to  Whitehall — "  I  think 
there  are  as  many  kinds  of  gardening  as  of 
poetry,"  he  says;  "your  makers  of  pastures  and 


54  FEOM   THE  PORCH 

flower-garden  sare  epigrammatists  and  sonneteers 
in  this  art ;  contrivers  of  grottos,  treillages,  and 
cascades  are  romantic  writers :  '  Wise '  and 
'  Loudon ' "  (the  Royal  gardeners)  "  are  our  heroic 
poets,  and  if,  as  a  critic,  I  may  single  out  any 
passage  of  their  works  to  commend  I  shall  take 
notice  of  that  part  of  the  upper  gardens  at 
Kensington  which  was  at  first  nothing  but  a 
gravel  pit.  It  must  have  been  a  fine  genius 
for  gardening  that  could  have  thought  of  form- 
ing such  an  unsightly  hollow  into  so  beautiful  an 
area,  and  to  have  hit  the  eyes  with  so  uncommon 
and  agreeable  a  scene  as  that  which  it  is  now 
wrought  into." 

As  children,  we  used  to  play  in  the  great 
alcove,  so  beautiful  and  dignified,  which  once 
stood  with  its  back  to  the  Kensington  Road 
(there  was  also  a  smaller  erection  not  far  off 
which  on  the  whole  we  preferred,  for  the  seats 
were  not  so  far  from  the  ground).  The  alcove, 
though  we  did  not  know  it  then,  was  built  by 
Wren  of  marble  and  brick  combined,  and  be- 
longed to  Queen  Anne's  private  garden,  and 
there  is  a  legend  that  the  French  emigres  used 
it  as  a  place  where  mass  was  sung  at  the  time. 


DREAM  OF  KENSINGTON  GARDENS  55 

In  those  days  Kensington  House  stood  behind  its 
scrolled  gates  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  road, 
and  the  Prince  de  Broglie  was  living  there  with 
the  Jesuit  Fathers  and  the  boys  under  their 
charge.  The  future  Charles  X  once  came  to 
visit  the  Abbe  Prince  and  the  Due  de  Gramont 
and  the  other  exiled  magnates. 

Lalor  Sheil  describes  Kensington  House,  to 
which  he  was  sent  when  he  first  came  from 
Ireland.  It  was  a  college  established  by  Les 
Peres  de  la  Foi — so  the  French  Jesuits  settled 
in  England  called  themselves  at  that  time. 
The  description,  quoted  l)y  Leigh  Hunt,  is  so 
interesting  I  cannot  help  quoting  it  again  : 

"The  Abbe  de  Grimaud  accordingly  set  off 
for  Kensington  House,  which  is  situated  exactly 
opposite  the  avenue  leading  to  the  Palace.  A 
large  iron  gate,  wrought  into  rusty  flowers 
and  other  fantastic  forms,  showed  that  the 
Jesuit  school  had  once  been  the  residence  of 
some  person  of  distinction"  (a  mistress  of 
Charles  II  had  lived  there  once).  "  It  was  a 
large,  old-f;\shioned  house,  with  many  remains 
of  decayed  splendour ;  and  a  beautiful  walk 
of    trees     ran     down     from    the     rear    of     the 


56  FROM  THE  POUCH 

building.  I  saw  several  French  boys  playing, 
and  my  ears  were  filled  with  the  shrill  vocifera- 
tions of  some  hundreds  of  little  emigrants.  .  .  . 
Having  got  this  peep  at  the  gaiety  of  the 
school,  I  was  led  with  my  companion  to  a 
chamber  decorated  with  faded  gilding,  where  I 
found  the  head  of  the  establishment,  Monsieur 
le  Prince  de  Broglie.  I  saw  in  him  a  little, 
slender,  and  gracefully  constructed  Abbe ;  he 
had  a  gentle  smile,  full  of  suavity.  .  .  .  Monsieur 
le  Prince  had  all  the  attitudes  of  the  Court, 
and  his  demeanour  at  once  put  me  in  mind  of 
the  old  regime.  He  welcomed  my  companion 
with  tenderness,  and,  having  heard  he  was 
about  to  return  to  France,  the  poor  gentle- 
man exclaimed,  *  Helas ! '  while  the  tears  came 
into  his  eyes." 

Lalor  Sheil  recalls  a  curious  fact  *'  that  when- 
ever news  arrived  of  a  victory  won  by  Bonaparte, 
the  whole  school  was  thrown  into  a  ferment, 
and  I  cannot  forget  the  exultation  with  which 
the  sons  of  the  decapitated  or  the  exile  hailed 
the  triumph  of  the  French  arms." 

"  Old  gentlemen,  the  neatness  of  whose  attire 
was    accompanied    by    indications    of   indigence, 


DREAM  OF  KENSINGTON  GARDENS  57 

used    occasionally    to    visit    Kensington   House ; 
their  elasticity  of  back,  the  gracefulness  of  their 
well-regulated   bows,   and    the    perpetual   smile 
upon  their  wrinkled  and  emaciated  faces  showed 
they  had  something  to  do  with  the  vieille  Coitr, 
as  did   the   embrace  with   which   they  enfolded 
the    little    marquises    and    counts    whom    they 
came    to    visit.      I    recollect    upon   one   occasion 
having  been  witness  to  a  very  remarkable  scene. 
Monsieur,    as    he    was   then,    the   present    King 
of  France,   waited    one   day   with   a   very  large 
retinue  upon  the  Prince  de  Broglie.     The  whole 
body   of  the    schoolboys  was   assembled   to   re- 
ceive   him,   gathered  in  a  circle  at  the  bottom 
of  a   flight  of  stone    stairs.     The   future  King 
of  France    appeared    with    his    cortege    at    the 
top  of  the  stairs,  and  the  moment  he  was  seen 
we  all  exclaimed,  with  a  shrill  shout  of  beard- 
less  loyalty,   '  Vive  le   Roi.'      Monsieur   seemed 
greatly    gratified   by    this    spectacle,    and    in    a 
very   gracious    manner    went    down    among   the 
boys.     He  asked  the  names  of  those  who  were 
about  him,  and  when  he  heard  them,  and   saw 
in  the  boys  by  whom  he  was  encompassed  the 
descendants    of   some   of    the    noblest    families 


58  FROM   THE  PORCH 

of  France,  he  seemed  to  be  sensibly  affected ; 
one  or  two  names  which  were  associated  with 
pecuHarly  melancholy  recollections  made  him 
thrill.  '  Helas,  mon  enfant ! '  he  used  to  say 
as  some  orphan  was  brought  up  to  him,  and 
he  would  then  lean  down  to  caress  the  head 
of  a  child  whose  parents  had  perished  on  the 
scaffolds  of  the  Revolution." 


MONOGRAPHS 


SAINTE    JEANNE    FRANgOISE 
DE    CHANTAL 

I 

We  are  most  of  us  used  to  translating  our  daily 
impressions  and  fancies  into  pen-and-ink  and 
pencil  jottings,  and  to  find  an  incontestable 
pleasure  in  so  doing.  But  there  is  another 
entertainment  still  more  fascinating,  in  which 
the  result  often  outstrips  the  imagination — it  is 
the  process  of  translating  the  printed  para- 
graph back  again  into  real  life.  Dean  Stanley 
says  somewhere,  that  to  see  the  place  where  a 
remarkable  event  has  happened,  is  in  a  measure 
to  live  the  event  itself  over  again ;  and,  in  a 
like  manner,  to  see  the  places  of  which  one  has 
been  reading  is  a  revelation — the  whole  book 
comes  to  life,  the  sentences  start  into  sound, 
into  colour  and  motion  :    the  reality  is  there. 

Some  years  ago,  when  the  writer  of  this  pre- 
sent divagation  was  engaged  upon  a  translation 


62  FROM   THE   PORCH 

of  some  of  Madame  de  Sevigne's  letters  for  Mrs. 
Oliphant's  edition  of  Foreign  Classics,  she  became 
acquainted  for  the  first  time  with  the  story  of 
that  saintly  grandmother  whose  virtues  the 
Rabutins  so  proudly  counted  among  their  digni- 
ties, and  whose  name  occurs  in  its  place  with  the 
baronesses  and  the  heiresses  of  blood-royal  whose 
arms  are  quartered  upon  their  ancient  heraldries. 
The  story  of  this  strange,  passionate,  aspiring, 
practical  woman  is  a  very  striking  one.  She 
left  her  young  son,  her  father,  her  many  natural 
ties  and  associations,  her  very  sorrow  and  crown 
of  widow's  weeds,  in  order  to  devote  her  remark- 
able powers  and  enthusiastic  piety  to  a  religious 
life,  and  to  the  founding  of  convents  all  about 
France  and  Savoy ;  before  her  death  no  fewer 
than  eighty-seven  of  these  institutions  owed  their 
existence  to  her  energy.  A  book  from  the  London 
Library  called  Les  Filles  de  Saints  Cliantal  still 
further  deepened  the  impression  made  upon  me 
by  the  history  of  this  saint  and  of  her  early 
trials ;  and  thus  it  happened  that,  being  in 
Savoy  once,  scarce  an  hour's  journey  from  Annecy, 
which  had  been  her  home  for  so  long,  I  found 
myself  starting  on  a  pilgrimage  to  the  shrine  of 


SAINTE   JEANNE   DE   CHANTAL     63 

Ste.  Chantal,  travelling  as  pilgrims  do  nowa- 
days, in  the  corner  of  a  first  -  class  railway 
carriage,  with  a  return  ticket.  A  comfortable 
Frenchman  sat  opposite  to  me,  studying  guides 
and  maps  and  time-tables.  In  my  own  "  Murray  " 
I  read  of  Annecy  :  "  An  industrious  city  on  the 
north  extremity  of  the  lake;  pop.,  11,600;  H. 
Verdun,  H.  d'Angleterre  "  ;  of  a  fine  cheese  made 
upon  the  mountains:  and  I  borrowed  "Joanne" 
from  the  Frenchman,  which  contains  further 
information.  St.  Francis  de  Sales  is  also  buried 
at  Annecy.  I  tell  my  fellow-traveller  that  I 
am  froins:  to  visit  the  shrines  of  Ste.  Chantal 
and  St.  Francis,  and,  if  possible,  to  catch  the 
steamer  afterwards.  He  does  not  know  much 
about  the  saints ;  he  advises  me  not  to  miss 
the  tour  du  lac,  to  take  a  carriage  by  the  hour, 
and  above  all,  to  dine  at  the  Hotel  d'Angleterre 
on  my  return.  While  we  converse,  the  train 
stops  at  a  little  roadside  station,  where  stands 
a  sportsman  with  huge  boots,  such  as  I  have 
seen  at  the  Lyceum  Theatre.  He  has  a  broad 
hat,  a  gun,  a  splendid  warlike  appearance ;  he 
has  shot  a  rabbit.  Then  we  start  off  again, 
travelling  past  vineyards  and  villages,  past  rural 


64  FROM   THE   PORCH 

country  scenes  all  bounded  and  enclosed  by  swell- 
ing   hills.       As   the   train    proceeds,   the    scene 
changes :   a  torrent  is  rushing  down   far  below 
in  a  shadowy  defile,  between  rocks  heaped  pile 
upon  pile  ;  the  green  and  golden  veils  of  autumn 
are  falling  from  every  ridge,  and  creepers,  and 
straggling  ivy,  and  unaccustomed  flowers,  with 
wild,  sweet  heads,  are  starting  from  the  rocks, 
also   mountain  -  ash   trees   here  and   there,  with 
their  red  berries  lighting  up  the  shade.     A  sound 
of  dashing  waters  is  in  the  air,  singing  an  accom- 
paniment to  the  wheels  of  the  railway  carriages 
as  they  whirl  the  tourists  along  the  heights.     The 
tourists,  with  their  heads  at  the  railway  carriage 
windows  are  peering  down  from  their  altitudes 
into  the  Gorge  du  Fier  below.     Presently  we  leave 
the  rocks  and  the  ravines  behind  us,  and  come 
to  Annecy  in  the  blazing  sunshine.     I  followed 
my  companion's  advice,  and  took  a  little  carriage 
at  the  station.      The  town  w^as   basking  under 
the  blue  sky,  with  many  spires  and  gables  and 
weathercocks  round  about  the  stately  old  castle. 
A  few  minutes'  drive  across  the  place  brought 
me  to  the  cool,  high,  marble  and  gilded  church 
where    the    two    saints,    St.    Francis    and    Ste. 


SAINTE   JEANNE   DE   CHANTAL     65 

Chantal  lie  resting  from  the  heat  of  the  sun 
and  from  the  furious  winter's  rages.  They  He 
each  above  a  golden  altar,  enshrined  in  a  crystal 
coffin.  As  I  come  up,  some  schoolgirls  with 
bandboxes,  a  lady  carrying  a  carpet-bag,  with 
two  little  boys  in  Scotch  costume,  advance  and 
put  down  their  encumbrances,  and  kneeling  kiss 
a  reliquary  fastened  to  a  column  :  it  consists  of 
a  pearl-set  scrap  of  bone,  which  jars  somehow 
upon  one's  English  notions.  A  lay  sister  in  the 
dress  of  the  Yisitantines,  who  had  been  scrubbing 
a  marble  step,  rises  and  quietly  draws  a  curtain 
from  before  the  crystal  coffin,  showing  us  a  divine 
vision  overhead  of  a  dark  robe  spread  upon  a 
cushion,  and  a  waxen  hand  among  its  folds. 
There  lie  all  the  mortal  remains  of  Jeanne 
Fremyot,  Baronne  de  Kabutin -Chantal. 

It  is  not  here  in  this  silent  marble  church, 
however,  that  one  can  most  realise  that  energetic 
spirit  whose  work  is  not  over  yet,  but  every- 
where else,  in  the  broad  old  streets,  where  the 
women  sit  beneath  the  arches,  or  lean  from  their 
windows  along  narrow  tributaries  and  defiles  of 
stone,  not  unlike  the  Gorges  du  Fier  in  their 
shadowy  gloom.     Everything   seemed    to   recall 


66  FROM   THE   PORCH 

the  past:  the  stone  front  of  the  old  palace  of 
the  De  Sales,  with  its  carved  balconies  and 
facings,  the  Convent  of  the  Sisters  of  the  Visita- 
tion standing  within  view  of  the  lake  (and  close 
to  it,  strangely  enough,  the  window  where  Jean 
Jacques  Rousseau  first  began  to  spin  his  web, 
and  to  glare  out  upon  the  world), — all  these  places 
seem  still  to  echo  with  the  voice  and  the  steps 
of  the  woman  who  travelled  so  long,  and  to  so 
much  purpose.  In  the  oldest  part  of  the  town, 
the  house  is  still  shown,  the  "  Maison  de  la 
Galerie,"  in  which  she  began  her  conventual 
life ;  and  it  was  thither  I  told  the  coachman 
to  drive  me  before  visiting  the  convent  itself. 
Presently  the  man  pointed  with  his  whip,  and 
I  got  out  of  the  carriage  and  looked  up  the  old 
perpendicular  street,  at  the  tall  houses  piled  each 
upon  each,  with  broad  eaves  casting  their 
shadows,  with  broken  wooden  galleries  running 
along  their  weather-stained  fronts,  where  rags 
were  fluttering  that  seemed  almost  as  old  as 
the  houses.  Here,  indeed,  was  a  chapter  come 
to  life  out  of  my  printed  book,  with  sounds  in 
the  air  and  a  burning  sky,  with  the  women 
knitting  at  their  doors,  and  the  children  starting 


SAINTE  JEANNE   DE   CHANTAL     67 

from  every  flight  of  steps.  It  was  not  quite 
Italy,  but  almost  Italy.  Every  one  stared  at 
me  as  I  went  along.  Once  I  stopped  breathless 
half-way  up  the  hill,  opposite  a  house  with  a 
carving  over  the  door,  and  "1602"  cut  deep 
into  the  stone.  As  I  looked  this  ancient  date 
seemed  to  become  the  present  once  again,  I 
myself — the  remembrance  of  my  peaceful  sub- 
urban home,  my  distant  family — was  nowhere, 
and,  as  in  Plans  Andersen's  story  of  Tlie  Shoes 
of  Fortune,  the  past  was  present.  Who  was 
this  coming  striding  down  the  street,  with  heavy 
footfalls  and  long  flapping  robes  ?  Was  it  St. 
Francis  in  his  well-known  square  cap,  with 
earnest  looks  and  gestures,  and  dark  eyes  not 
to  be  forgotten  ?  No !  it  was  only  a  dull  priest 
from  the  seminary  up  above,  with  a  vacant, 
indifferent  face,  who  shrugged  his  worn  and 
greasy  shoulders,  pointed  vaguely,  and  trudged 
on  without  answering  when  I  asked  him  which 
was  the  house  where  Ste,  Chantal  had  lived. 
As  he  disappeared  down  the  hill,  an  aged  woman, 
with  a  long  shabby  garment  hanging  from  her 
bent  back,  came  slowly  up,  looking  curiously  at 
me  with  a  bright,  inquisitive    face  :   "  Madame, 


68  FROM   THE   PORCH 

madame,  you  are  looking  for  the  house  of  la 
Mere  Chantal  ?  This  is  it,  this  is  it ;  look 
at  the  date  over  the  door !  Oh !  many  come, 
and  we  show  it  to  them  all.  Here  is  Marianne, 
she  will  tell  you  the  same ;  we  both  live  in  the 
street — the  nuns  are  gone."  As  she  spoke  I  won- 
dered to  what  order  of  suffering  necessity  these 
poor  souls  themselves  belonged ;  to  what-  wide 
community  for  which  no  dignities  of  renunciation 
and  self-infliction  are  needed  to  add  to  the 
austerity  of  its  daily  rule !  They  hobbled  into 
the  house,  and  beckoned  for  me  to  follow.  "  Not 
upstairs,"  says  Marianne ;  "  we  cannot  take 
Madame  upstairs,  there  are  too  many  locataires 
for  that ;  but  Jean  shall  show  her  the  place 
where  the  dead  body  was  found."  And  Jean, 
a  young  locksmith  in  a  big  leather  apron,  appears 
with  a  spluttering  candle  from  out  of  a  low, 
arched,  ground-floor  room,  in  which  he  had  been 
at  work.  While  he  was  unlocking  a  heavy  door, 
I  gazed  up  the  heavy  stone  staircase  and  round 
and  about  the  filthy  old  house,  and  tried  to 
imagine  it  in  its  once  order  and  good  trim,  and 
inhabited  by  the  saint  and  her  faithful  com- 
panions ;  and  then  I  find  myself  descending  by 


SAINTE  JEANNE   DE   CHANTAL     69 

a  black  and  gloomy  staircase  into  a  cellar  below 
the  level  of  the  street.  "  This  is  where  the 
corpse  was  found,"  says  Marianne,  pointing  with 
her  skinny  finger  to  a  hole  in  the  masonry.  As 
I  looked  from  the  black  hole  to  the  gloomy  exit, 
I  remember  my  purse  and  my  gold  watch,  and 
give  one  wistful  thought  to  my  distant  home 
and  family  as  I  wonder  whether  Jean  and 
Marianne  would  have  much  difficulty  in  adding 
to  the  attractions  of  this  interesting  burying- 
place ;  but  one  glance  at  their  honest  faces 
made  me  ashamed  of  my  terrors.  "  Have  you 
seen  enough  ? "  says  old  Marianne.  "  Dark, 
isn't  it  ?  and  what  a  hole !  eh  ! "  And  so  we 
all  file  up  again  after  the  candle,  which  Jean 
carefully  blows  out  when  we  get  to  the  top 
once  more.  Absurd  as  my  hunt  after  associations 
had  been,  I  seemed  to  come  away  from  the  old 
street  with  a  clearer  impression  in  my  mind  of 
the  life  which  I  was  trying  to  realise  than  that 
which  any  relics,  even  though  set  in  pearls, 
could  conjure  up.  I  could  picture  the  deter- 
mined woman,  with  her  strong,  unbending  will, 
coming  hither,  leaving  home  and  all  its  claims 
and  living  distractions,  bent  upon  the  sacrifice 


70  FROM   THE   PORCH 

of  all  that  remained  of  her  past,  with  a  selfish, 
irrepressible  passion  to  serve  God  and  to  find 
h<irself;  that  motive  self,  in  pursuit  of  which 
people  are  unconsciously  striving  all  their  lives 
long. 

II 

The  saint,  rtee  Jeanne  Frangoise  Fremyot, 
was  married  at  twenty  to  the  Baron  de 
Rabutin-Chantal,  one  of  the  most  accomplished 
cavaliers  of  the  day.  We  read  of  her  as  much 
beloved,  and  surnamed  "  La  Dame  Parfaite." 
She  was  graceful  and  gay,  "  of  a  generous  car- 
riage." She  left  her  father's  house  at  Dijon  for 
her  husband's  chateau  at  Bourbilly,  whither  he 
brought  her,  putting  everything  into  her  keeping 
— even  his  honour,  says  the  recording  nun  ;  for 
his  affairs  were  involved  and  complicated,  and 
the  task  of  rectifying  them  was  a  heavy  one, 
from  which  the  girl  would  have  shrunk.  But 
he  appealed  to  her  for  help  to  enable  him  to  be 
free  to  leave  at  the  first  call  of  duty,  so  as  to 
serve  his  country  and  his  king.  Henry  IV  of 
France  greatly  depended  upon  him,  and  was  for 
ever  summoning  him  to  his  camp  and  to  his  court. 


SAINTE   JEANNE   DE   CHANTAL     71 

A  day  came,  however,  when  Chantal's  higher 
sense  of  duty  compelled  him  to  quit  the  King's 
service.  He  had  been  desired  to  carry  out  that 
which  seemed  to  him  dishonouring,  and  rather 
than  obey  he  resigned  his  post.  In  a  farewell 
poem  addressed  to  the  ladies  of  the  court,  this 
gallant  seigneur  dwells  upon  the  thought  of 
his  dear  wife  at  home,  to  whom  he  was  re- 
turning. 

His  time  with  her  at  Bourbilly  was  full  of 
peaceful  happiness,  but  it  was  only  too  short. 
He  had  spent  his  life  in  danger,  but  it  was  a 
mere  accident  which  caused  his  death  when 
shooting  with  a  friend  in  the  woods  hard  by 
the  castle.  A  shot  miscarried.  He  fell  mortally 
wounded.  His  wife  came  running  to  hhn. 
"Ah!  madame,"  he  said.  "The  decree  of 
heaven  is  that  we  should  love  and  that  we 
should  die" 

After  a  while  she  w^ent  back  to  her  old  home 
in  Dijon,  where  her  father,  President  Fremyot, 
was  living  with  her  brother  the  Bishop.  The 
President  was  a  charming  and  gentle  old  man, 
devoted  to  his  daughter  and  her  children,  and 
he  welcomed  them  tenderly. 


72  FROM   THE   POECH 

Unfortunately,  the  other  grandfather,  the  grun 
Baron   de    Chantal,    was    still   alive,    a    man    of 
seventy-five,  living  at  the  Chateau  de  Monthelon 
under  the  domination  of  an  evil  woman,  a  ser- 
vante  niaUrense,  as  she  is  termed  by  the  chronic- 
ling nun.     She  never  left  him,  but  with  her  five 
children  wasted  his  means,  and  the  great  gloomy 
house  was  falling  more  and  more  into  disorder 
and  neglect.     Was  it  fear  of  her,  or  some  prick  of 
conscience  which  induced  the  old  man  to  write 
to    his   daughter-in-law,    ordering   her    to    come 
and   live    with   him,   bringing  her  children   too, 
and  threatening  otherwise  to  marry  immediately 
and  disinherit  them  all  ?     Jeanne  thought  it  her 
duty  to  obey,  and   for    seven   years   endured  a 
purgatory,   concealing   the   insults   she   suffered, 
and  carefully  shielding  her  children  from  the  evil 
around  them,  praying  with  them,  and  teaching 
them,  visiting  the  poor,  inspiring  and   uplifting 
all   who   came    near    her,      Even    the   maitresse 
servante  and  her  children  seem  in  a  measure  to 
have  fallen  under  her  influence. 

In  this  time  of  trouble  Jeanne  had  a  dream, 
in  which  a  holy  personage  was  revealed  to  her, 
bringing   her   help   and    inspiration.      Not   long 


SAINTE  JEANNE   DE   CHANTAL     73 

afterwards  St.  Francis  de  Sales  came  to  preach 
at  Dijon  and  Madame  de  Chantal  obtained 
leave  from  her  father-in-law — not  without  diffi- 
culty— to  go  home  in  order  to  attend  some  of 
these  ministrations.  Her  biographer,  Mere  de 
Chaugy,  relates  that  at  the  very  first  meeting 
with  the  saintly  prelate  she  recognised  in  him 
the  vision  she  had  seen,  and  she  put  herself 
under  his  direction. 

Jeanne  now  found  in  St.  Francis  a  friend  and 
an  adviser  whom  she  could  trust,  who  assisted 
her  in  all  her  difficulties  and  cares.  It  was  not 
long  before  she  took  courage  to  pour  out  her 
heart's  desires  to  him,  and  to  tell  him  her  secret 
aspirations  after  a  life  entirely  given  up  to  the 
service  of  God.  For  years  past  she  had  been 
meditating  upon  this  possibility,  but  had  not 
liked  to  speak  of  it,  and  it  was  to  this  end  she 
had  resolutely  put  aside  all  idea  of  re-marriage. 

The  Bishop's  remarkable  insight  into  other 
people's  hearts  and  experiences  still  impresses 
us,  as  well  as  his  unremitting  and  unstinting 
efforts  to  help  to  direct  and  stimulate  all  those 
dei)ending  upon  him.  St.  Francis  seems  to  have 
been  a  sort  of  Dr.  Arnold  among  saints,  with  a 


74  FROM   THE   PORCH 

practical  genius  for  saving  other  souls  as  well 
as  his  own,  and  an  especial  sympathy  for  the 
young  life  around  him.  Little  Marie- Aymde, 
Jeanne's  eldest  daughter,  had  a  strong  feeling 
for  him ;  she  used  to  hide  behind  a  curtain,  so 
as  to  gaze  at  this  great  Bishop,  who  used  to  call 
the  children  his  petit  peuple,  his  petit  menage, 
and  who  loved  to  be  surrounded  by  them.  It 
was  by  his  advice  that  Madame  de  Chantal, 
who  had  been  admirable  but  somewhat  stern 
as  a  mother,  now  relaxed  her  rule,  and  allowed 
something  of  "  that  gaiety  necessary  ifor  their 
tender  spirits."  "  Vivez  toute  joyeuse,"  the 
Bishop  used  to  say  to  her  ;  "be  happy  in  God  who 
is  your  joy  and  your  consolation."  Little  Marie - 
Aymee  was  a  remarkable  and  well-grown  child. 
Her  mother  had  once  destined  her  for  the  Life 
Religious  ;  but  when  Marie-Aymee  had  reached 
the  age  of  eight  years,  it  was  determined,  by 
St.  Francis'  advice,  and  in  consultation  with 
the  two  grandfathers  and  with  the  child  herself, 
that  she  was  more  fitted  for  the  world  than  the 
cloister.  St.  Francis  was  certainly  in  advance 
of  his  time  when  he  urged  upon  parents  to  re- 
spect their  children's  wills.     Little  Aymee  was 


SAINTE   JEANNE   DE   CHANTAL     75 

the  delight  of  her  aged  grandfather  De  Chantal, 
and  of  President  Fremyot.  She  is  described 
as  beautiful  as  an  angel,  daily  kneeling  in  the 
chapel  by  her  mother,  and  praying  in  silent 
orison.  Very  early  in  life  her  future  fate  was 
decided.  On  one  occasion,  when  Madame  de 
Chantal  had  followed  the  procession  of  the  Holy 
Sacrament  through  the  streets  of  Annecy,  she 
returned,  breathless  with  fatigue,  to  the  Bishop's 
palace,  and  Bernard  de  Sales,  the  youngest 
brother  of  St.  Francis,  among  other  gentlemen, 
advanced  to  help  her  up  the  steps.  Madame 
de  Chantal  accepted  young  Bernard's  arm.  "  I 
shall  take  him  for  my  share,"  she  said,  smiling, 
to  one  of  the  company ;  and  these  words,  being 
repeated,  seemed  prophetic  to  Madame  de  Boisy, 
the  mother  of  the  De  Sales  brothers.  When 
Marie  -  Aymee  had  reached  the  mature  age  of 
twelve  years,  Madame  de  Boisy  sent  St.  Francis  to 
ask  the  little  girl's  mother  for  her  hand  in  marriage 
for  Bernard,  the  youngest  and  most  cherished 
son.  Never  was  Madame  de  Chantal  more 
troubled,  more  perplexed,  says  the  history  ;  but 
by  degrees  she  came  to  share  Madame  de  Boisy's 
ardent  desires ;  only  it  required  all  her  prayers 


7^  FROM   THE   PORCH 

and  all  ^her  determination  to  persuade  the  two 
grandfathers  to  agree  to  her  wishes.  The  Presi- 
dent Fremyot  most  reluctantly  consented.  Writ- 
ing to  the  Bishop,  he  says  that  only  the  strength 
of  the  desire  of  the  Baroness  could  have  with- 
drawn the  little  one  from  his  arms,  from  between 
his  knees,  from  before  his  eyes. 


HI 

The  story  of  the  family  life  of  the  De  Sales 
is   like    a    fairy    tale.     There    are    five   brothers 
living  in   their  beautiful   old   castle   among   the 
mountains  of  Savoy,   under    the    loving  rule  of 
their  widowed  mother  and  of  St.   Francis,   the 
elder  son.     To  him,  at  his  father's  death,  fell  the 
duty  of  dividing  their  fortune  into  five  shares. 
So  the  old  Baron  had  appointed.     The  youngest 
son  was  to  take  the  first  choice  and  the  eldest 
the  last.     The  youngest  and  most  accomplished 
of  the  five  brothers  was  Bernard,  of  whom  an 
enthusiastic  description  was  written  at  the  time. 
"Gold   was    in    his   hair,"   says   his   biographer, 
"  alpine    snow^  in    his   complexion,   azure   in    his 
eyes,  dignity  in  his  presence."     He  was  advised 


SAINTE  JEANNE   DE   CHANTAL     11 

to  take  the  family  home  for  his  share,  and  the 
barony  of*  Thorens  went  with  it. 

There  is  a  fanciful  description  of  the  chateau 
which  Richard  Doyle  might  have  depicted. 
Courts  within  courts,  fountains  playing,  towers 
and  terraces,  the  twenty-six  guest  chambers 
decorated  with  pictures  and  carvings  and 
armorial  bearings.  St.  Francis'  description  of 
feeding  the  birds  there  is  well  known.  "  It  had 
been  snowing,  and  the  court  was  deeply  covered," 
he  wrote.  "Jean  came  into  the  centre  of  the 
court  and  swept  a  little  place  enimi  la  neige, 
and  he  flung  here  and  there  grain  to  feed  the 
pigeons,  who  came  altogether  to  take  their 
refection  with  admirable  peace  and  respect.  I 
amused  myself  by  looking  at  them.  You  cannot 
believe  what  edification  these  little  creatures 
gave  me.  They  never  said  a  single  little  word, 
and  those  who  had  finished  their  refection  first 
flew  away  to  wait  for  the  others,  and  when  these 
had  cleared  the  half,  a  quantity  of  little  birds 
who  were  watching  came  round  about  them, 
and  all  the  pigeons  who  were  still  eating  retired 
into  a  corner  to  leave  the  greater  part  of  the 
room   to  the  little  birds.  ...  In    short,  I   was 


78  FEOM   THE   PORCH 

near  tears  to  see  the  charitable  simplicity  of 
the  pigeons  and  the  confidence  of  the  little  birds 
on  their  charity.  I  know  not  if  a  preacher 
would  have  touched  me  as  much." 

This  was  the  home  to  which  Marie-Aymde  was 
welcomed  by  all  the  De  Sales  and  by  her  special 
protector,  St.  Francis. 

"  To  see  her  in  her  home,"  writes  Mere 
Chaugy,  "not  yet  fifteen  years,  was  a  marvel, 
beautiful  as  a  lovely  day,  with  modesty  in  her 
countenance,  with  noble  ways,  yet  affable  and 
gracious  to  all  who  came  to  her  respecting  the 
conduct  of  the  house." 

Her  subsequent  history  is  the  most  pathetic 
imaginable.  Married  at  fourteen,  at  sixteen  she 
was  mourning  her  first  child.  And  before  she 
was  twenty  she  died,  already  a  widow,  in  her 
mother's  arms. 

It  was  after  Aymee's  marriage  that  her  mother 
felt  the  time  had  at  last  come  to  retire  in  com- 
pany with  certain  pious  ladies  from  the  world, 
taking  with  her  the  two  younger  girls  to 
educate.  It  is  said  that  when  she  parted  from 
her  son,  he  passionately  flung  himself  across 
the  threshold  of  the  door ;  she  burst  into  tears 


SAINTE  JEANNE   DE   CHANTAL     79 

as  she  stepped  across  his  body  ;  but  immediately 
turning  round,  slie  faced  her  desolate  family  with 
a  radiant  face,  and  broke  into  a  triumphant  psalm. 
To  Marie-Aymee,  who  had  always  lived  in 
spacious  homes,  the  sight  of  the  house,  the 
Maison  de  la  Galerie  to  which  Ste.  Chantal 
first  retired,  was  a  great  shock.  The  Convent 
of  the  Yisitantines,  to  which  Ste.  Chantal 
after\vards  removed,  was  a  pleasanter  place  than 
that  dark  house  in  the  mediaeval  street,  altliough 
saints  and  bishops  seem  to  have  trodden  it  and 
St.  Francis  himself  lived  there.  The  Convent 
of  the  Visitation  stands  open  to  the  light  and 
to  the  sweetness  of  the  lake.  It  comes  back 
to  me  still  with  its  distant  view  of  mountains 
and  of  summer  farms,  wliere  the  oxen  were 
carting  the  hay  and  the  broad  chestnut  trees 
spread  their  branches.  The  sun  was  beginning 
to  sink  when  I  came  away.  The  towers  of  the 
castle,  the  gables  of  the  old  town,  looked  black 
and  splendid  in  the  foreground.  Some  priests 
were  reading  their  breviaries  on  the  steps  of  the 
terrace.  The  nuns,  in  the  dress  of  Ste.  Chantal, 
sat  motionless  with  the  light  in  their  faces,  look- 
ing after  me  as  I  departed. 


80  FPtOM   THE   PORCH 

They  still    show   Ste.   Chantal's   room  in  the 
old  Convent  of  the  Visitation  at  Annecy.     It  is 
an   old,  sunny   house,   with    massive  walls,   and 
with  bare  lights,  and  a  tranquil,  vine-wreathed 
garden.     There  was  a  galerie  there  too,  which 
fell  into  decay  long  ago,  and  was  removed ;  but 
the  place  cannot  be  much  changed  since  the  saint 
first   came  thither.     There  are  the   cross-lights 
in    her    bedroom,    and    the    tall    chimney-piece 
where   the   seven    hearts   are   carved   in   stone, 
and  over  which  hangs  the  portrait  of  St.  Francis. 
"  He  was,  for  all  his  gentleness,  a  man  of  strong 
and  passionate  temper,"  said  the  good  nun  very 
reverently,    as   she   showed   me   the   old    panel. 
At  his  death,  they  found  out  what  restraint  he 
had  ever   put   upon   himself:    his  liver  was   all 
broken  into  little  pieces,  so  they  declared.     It 
was   here  that   little   Marie -Aymee   must   have 
come    after    her    husband's    departure    for   the 
army,   and  where  St.  Francis  brought   her  the 
cruel  news  of  poor    Bernard's   untimely   death. 
"Helas!"    said  the  poor  Bishop,  as  he  hurried 
to  the  convent  with  his  heavy  tidings,  "  my  own 
affliction  is  charged  with  that  of  our  poor  little 
one,   and  of  our  Mere  cle  Chantal."     When   he 


SAINTE   JEANNE   DE   CITANTAL      81 

came  to  Marie-Aym^e,  he  heard  her  confession, 
and  blessed  her,  speaking  with  encouraging 
cheerfulness.  "  And  now,  my  daughter,"  he  said, 
"  are  we  not  anxious  to  receive  from  the  hand 
of  God  that  which  it  is  His  will  to  inflict  upon 
us  ? "  *'  Ah,  yes  !  "  little  Aymee  answered,  with 
a  deep  sigh  ;  "  but,  alas !  you  have  come  to  tell 
me  that  my  husband  is  dead."  Before  many 
weeks,  the  young  wife  herself  and  her  infant 
child  had  rejoined  the  husband.  The  wonder 
is  that  any  one  survived  in  those  days ;  for  we 
read  that  immediately  after  the  birth  of  the 
baby,  while  the  young  mother  lay  in  great 
suffering,  all  the  ladies  of  the  town  came  up  to 
visit  her  and  to  condole  ;  the  nuns  stood  round 
about  the  poor  child's  bedside,  and  listened  to 
her  exhortations ;  she  made  her  will ;  she  was 
received,  as  she  lay  dying,  into  the  Order  of  the 
Visitation,  after  communicating  and  partaking 
of  the  last  unction ;  and  then  the  pure  spirit 
passed  away.  Poor  St.  Francis,  saint  as  he  was, 
would  not  meet  the  bereaved  mother.  "  I  know 
the  strength  of  her  soul,"  he  said,  "  the  weakness 
of  my  own,"  and  he  drove  away  across  the  fields. 
He  spoke  of  la  Mere  Chantal  as  a  saint,  but  of 


82  FROM   THE   PORCH 

Marie- Aymde  as  though  she  had  been  an  angel 
from  heaven. 

As  time  passed,  other  troubles  came  to  try  the 
courage  and  the  devotion  of  la  Mere  Chantal. 
Her  friend  St.  Francis  died,  her  son  died  in  the 
flower  of  his  age,  and  his  daughter,  the  saint's 
little  grand-daughter,  afterwards  Madame  de 
Sevigne,  the  "  Marquise  of  Marquises,"  was  left 
an  orphan.  There  is  a  strongly-marked  family 
likeness  between  the  portraits  of  the  two  women, 
when  one  compares  them  together — the  same 
half-humorous,  half-conscious  smile,  the  same 
well-defined  brows  and  full,  almond-shaped  eyes  ; 
but  the  saint's  features  are  larger  and  more 
marked,  with  less  of  delicacy  and  of  grace  than 
Madame  de  Sevigne's.  Though  life's  journey 
was  long,  and  grew  more  and  more  weary 
towards  the  close,  Ste.  Chantal  did  not  give 
in,  or  cease  her  interest,  her  exhortations,  her 
exertions.  She  had  lost  all  her  children  save 
one,  that  "  Francoise,"  the  "  tante  de  Toulonjon  " 
of  whom  we  read  in  the  Sevigne  letters ;  but  her 
adopted  children  were  everywhere,  and  clamour- 
ing for  her  presence,  her  help,  her  advice.  She 
feared  neitlier  famine,  nor  pestilence,  nor  fatigue  ; 


SAINTE   JEANNE   DE   CHANTAL      83 

in  the  depths  of  the  last  winter  of  her  life  she 
travelled  through  France,  She  went  in  a  litter 
because  of  her  great  age.  There  were  convents 
at  Paris  and  at  Moulin s  eagerly  soliciting  her 
presence,  and  the  brave  old  saint  started  cour- 
ageously on  this  long  and  fatiguing  journey.  On 
December  3rd,  1641,  on  her  returning  journey, 
she  parted  with  her  daughter,  who  had  been 
travelling  with  her.  She  wished  to  give  herself 
entirely  to  her  nuns  and  their  concerns,  and  also 
to  the  Duchesse  de  Montpensier,  who  had  been 
awaiting  her  arrival  at  Moulins  in  order  to  enter 
into  reUgio7i.  It  was  on  December  13th,  ten 
days  after  her  arrival  at  Moulins,  that  Ste. 
Chantal  passed  away  in  the  same  great  serenity 
in  which  she  had  lived. 


QUILLS    FROM   THE   SWAN    OF 
LICHFIELD 

I 

A  DELIGHTFUL  book  published  by  Mr.  Lucas, 
entitled  A  Swan  and  Her  Friends,  has  been 
in  our  hands,  and  those  among  us  who  have 
laughed  and  felt  grateful  for  the  fun,  the 
nonsense,  the  vitality,  which  have  given  so 
much  attraction  to  the  histories  of  those  won- 
derful people  living  in  wonderful  times,  may 
perhaps  be  interested  to  read  a  few  more  episodes 
from  Miss  Seward's  grandiloquent  experiences,  in 
addition  to  those  already  quoted  by  Mr.  Lucas 
himself. 

It  is  a  quarter  of  a  century  since  a  packet 
of  her  letters  came  into  the  present  writer's 
possession.  They  had  been  carefully  kept  by 
the  friend  (Mrs.  Sykes)  to  whom  they  were 
addressed,  and  from  her  they  had  descended  to 
her  daughter  and  her  granddaughter,  from 
whom  I  received  them.     When  I  first  read,  or 

81 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         85 

attempted  to  read,  the  correspondence,  it  did  not 
impress  me  favourably — the  elegant  expressions, 
the  threefold  adjectives,  the  emphasis  and  the 
illegibleness  of  all  these  emotions  seemed  too 
much  for  my  patience.  I  put  the  letters  away 
in  their  faded  envelope  and  almost  forgot  their 
existence ;  but  a  quarter  of  a  century  changes 
one's  views  of  life — it  certainly  ought  to  enlarge 
one's  perceptions.  When  I  looked  at  them  again, 
time  had  brought  to  light  a  vein  of  kindly 
simplicity  and  genuine  human  feeling  amid  all 
the  redundancies  of  the  Muse's  eloquence,  and 
I  had  a  daughter  to  help  me  to  decipher  the 
verbiage. 

One  has  heard  of  a  lion's  skin  used  to  disguise 
a  far  more  useful  quadruped — it  is  possible  in  the 
same  way  that  the  swan's  feathers  also  mantled 
a  domestic  bird,  whose  cackling,  as  we  know,  is 
not  always  to  be  despised.  Mr.  Lucas  asks  why 
Anna  Seward's  performances,  her  "  pontifical 
confidence,"  her  floridity,  and  her  sentimentalism, 
were  so  reverentially  accepted  in  her  time  ?  He 
gives  among  other  reasons  in  answer,  that  she 
was  a  pioneer,  writing  before  all  women  had 
found  out  that  they  too  could  write.     There  is 


86  FROM   THE   POUCH 

also  the  undoubted  fact  that  Anna  Seward  had 
more  initiative  and  spirit  than  most  other  people, 
either  at  Lichfield  or  in  London  itself;  and  what 
we  human  beings  seek  for  in  life,  is  life,  and  we 
instinctively  turn  to  it. 

No  one  looking  at  Miss  Seward's  portrait  at 
the  beginning  of  the  book  would  at  first  sight 
feel  any  inclination  to  smile,  or  to  venture  to 
think  of  it  without  awe.  It  is  that  of  a  serious, 
most  dignified,  and  majestic  person,  who  has 
evidently  been  holding  high  converse.  We  know 
that  Komney  painted  the  picture  during  the 
Muse's  visit  to  the  poet  Hayley.  She  holds  a 
scroll  in  one  hand ;  she  rests  her  oval  cheek 
on  the  other  palm  in  a  pensive  attitude,  more 
common  in  Miss  Seward's  day  than  now,  when 
there  are  so  many  armchairs  and  cushions  to 
lean  against.  Romney  also  painted  the  ink- 
stand and  the  eloquent  pen,  and  some  of  those 
vast  sheets  of  letter-paper  she  loved  to  cover 
with  adjectives.  There  are  two  other  likenesses 
given  ;  one  is  by  Kettle,  whose  picture  of  Anna 
has  a  real  individuality.  She  is  holding  an 
open  book — poetry  no  doubt.  Opie's  picture  is 
that  of  a  ribbon,  a  head-dress,  and  a  bouncing 


THE   SWAN   OF  LICHFIELD        87 

demoiselle,  and  belongs  to  the  time  when  the 
Muse  wished  to  be  known  as  "Julia"  among 
the  nymphs  of  the  hour.  Her  biographer  quotes 
from  a  grateful  poem  to  "  Julia,"  by  a  minor 
poet — recent  protests  notwithstanding,  there 
appear  to  have  been  minor  poets  in  those  days — 

''  And  basking  in  her  cordial  beams, 
The  fostered  Julia's  form  appears, 
The  Goddess  decked  her  tuneful  themes, 
Soft  warbling  thro'  revolving  years." 

On  one  occasion  another  admirer  seems  to 
have  appropriated  one  of  "  Julia's "  or  Anna's 
elegies.  There  is  an  amusing  passage  written 
long  after  by  Lord  Byron  to  Thomas  More, 
dated  Ravenna,  September  19,   1821  : 

"  With  respect  to  what  Anna  Seward  calls 
'  the  liberty  of  transcript,'  when  complaining 
of  Miss  Matilda  Muggleton,  the  accomplished 
daughter  of  a  choral  vicar  of  Worcester  Cathedral, 
who  had  abused  the  said  '  liberty  of  transcript ' 
by  inserting  in  the  Malvern  Mercury  Miss 
Seward's  Elegy  on  the  South  Pole  as  her  own 
production,  with  her  own  signature,  two  years 
after  having  taken  a  copy,  by  permission  of  the 
authoress — with   regard,   I   say,   to   the   '  liberty 


88  FEOM  THE  PORCH 

of  transcript,'  I  by  no  means  oppose  an  occa- 
sional copy  to  the  benevolent  few,  provided 
it  does  not  degenerate  into  such  licentiousness 
of  verb  and  noun  as  may  tend  to  disparage 
my  parts  of  speech,  by  the  carelessness  of  the 
transcribblers." 

Anna  Seward  was  seventeen  at  the  time 
when  her  sister  was  engaged  to  Mr.  Porter, 
Dr.  Johnson's  stepson ;  but  the  poor  young  bride 
died  suddenly  a  few  days  before  that  one  fixed 
for  her  marriage.  Mr.  Porter,  we  are  told, 
would  have  gladly  consoled  himself  by  a  union 
with  Anna,  only  she  would  not  hear  of  it.  In 
one  of  her  letters,  published  in  the  collected 
correspondence,  she  has  written  a  description  of 
the  young  man,  which  fully  accounts  for  her 
refusal.  It  was  to  endeavour  to  give  comfort 
to  the  poor  mother  that  Dr.  Seward  adopted 
Honora  Sneyd,  who  came  to  live  with  them 
after  Sarah's  death.  Honora  was  tenderly  loved 
by  Anna,  with  whom  she  studied,  and  in  whose 
company  she  must  have  gone  into  Lichfield 
society ;  we  hear  of  Honora's  charms  and  of 
her  admiring  swains ;  both  Thomas  Day  and 
Major    Andre    were    among    them,    as    well    as 


THE  SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD        89 

the    irresistible    Edgeworth,    who    finally    won 
her. 

In  1773  Honora  married  Mr.  Edgeworth, 
apparently  against  everybody's  wishes ;  she 
would  have  married  Andre  several  years  before 
had  her  father  consented.  We  have  Miss 
Seward's  description  of  Mr.  Edgeworth  on  his 
wedding  day,  by  which  it  will  be  seen  that  no 
one  was  very  cordially  pleased  with  the  con- 
nection. A  young  girl  in  all  her  beauty  and 
tenderness — a  gay  widower,  rejoicing  in  his  first 
wife's  death,  scarcely  suggested  romance,  even 
to  the  most  romantic. 

Among  the  letters  which  were  given  to  me, 
and  from  which  I  am  now  quoting,  are  several 
concerning  Mr,  Edgeworth.  They  are  addressed 
to  Mrs.  Sykes  at  Westella,  near  Hull,  and  are 
the  first  of  a  correspondence  which  lasted  for 
several  years.  The  two  friends  were  united  by 
many  links  of  affection  and  intimacy.  The 
letters  begin  in  a  light  and  cheerful  tone,  grow- 
ing emphatical  and  romantic  as  the  friendship 
deepens.  The  first  must  have  been  written  in 
the  early  spring  of  the  year  1773. 

"  Your  ruffles  and  your  work-bag  are  finished 


90  FROM   THE   PORCH 

(says  the  Muse).  I  wish  I  could  convey  them 
to  you,  do  tell  me  what  you  think  would  be  the 
best  way.  Mr.  Day  is  returned  to  England  ;  he 
was  in  Lichfield  last  week,  and  Mr.  Edge  worth 
is  delivered  from  his  galling  yoke,  *  again  to  life 
and  light  to  rise.'  Mrs.  Edge  worth  died  of  a 
violent  fever  in  London  ;  the  sprightly  widower 
is  still  at  Lyons,  unless  this  event  has  brought 
him  over  within  the  last  fortnight." 

The  next  epistle,  dated  July  27,  1773,  gives 
us  further  news  of  Mr.  Edgeworth  : 

"  Your  son  will  tell  you,  my  dear  Mrs.  Sykes, 
why  I  have  thus  long  delayed  answering  your 
kind  and  obliging  letter — and  that  my  time 
and  thoughts  were  taken  up  by  my  Honora's 
nuptials.  Saturday  seven-night  she  became  a 
bride  in  our  choir,  my  father  married  her  and  her 
own  gave  her  away,  not  with  the  best  grace  in 
the  world.  Mr.  Sneyd  and  Mr.  Edgeworth  are 
too  differing  to  like  each  other ;  the  former 
gave  Honor  a  a  thousand  pounds  and  articles  for 
another  at  his  death.  Mr.  E.  has  made  his  first 
children  independent  of  himself  at  the  age  of 
twenty -one,  and  settled  upon  Honora  four 
hundred  a   year  in  case  she   survives   him,  and 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         91 

six  hundred  till  her  own  children  receive  their 
fortunes.  His  estate  is  a  clear  fifteen  hundred 
pounds  a  year.  The  joy  of  united  hearts  and 
hands,  esteem,  friendship  and  congenial  talents, 
shone  in  the  lovely  faces  of  the  charming  pair. 
The  late  Mrs.  Edgeworth's  brother,  a  worthy 
agreeable  young  gentleman,  came  down  from 
London  on  purpose,  to  the  wedding,  and  spoke 
most  warmly  in  the  praise  of  Mr.  Edgeworth. — We 
were  a  smart  cavalcade, — and  behold,  Mr.  Grove 
graciously  condescended  to  come  over  to  accom- 
pany his  sister  Honora  to  church.  He  looked  a 
little  grave,  but  said  nothing  disobliging ;  I  was 
bridesmaid,  the  knot  was  tied  at  nine  o'clock, 
we  then  adjourned  to  Mr.  Sneyd's  to  breakfast. 
At  twelve  o'clock,  Mr.  Edgeworth  took  the  fair 
sweet  bride  into  his  phaeton,  and  drove  off 
triumphantly.  .  .  .  Well  may  he  triumph,  for 
he  has  obtained  a  matchless  prize.  They  are 
now  perhaps  upon  the  sea,  if  prosperous  winds 
waft  gently  over  the  happy  lovers,  '  And  on  the 
level  deep,  sleek  Panope  and  all  her  sisters  play.' 
But  alas !  I  fear  their  living  in  Ireland — Self 
will  still  be  predominant — She  is  happy,  I  bless 
Heaven   that   she   is  so,  but  she   is  absent  and 


92  FROM  THE  PORCH 

I  must  mourn — that  absence  will  perhaps  be 
long  and  continual,  seas  may  for  many  cheerless 
years  e'en  for  life  divide  my  Honora  from  her 
unfortunate  friend  M^iose  ardent  grasp  every  dear 
and  precious  pleasure  eludes,  and  leaves  her  with- 
out one  joyous  hour  to  bless  her  hopes.  I  had 
a  letter  from  Mrs.  Edgeworth  yesterday,  dated 
Chester,  she  expresses  the  utmost  happiness." 

Marriage  makes  new  ties  and  interests ;  it 
also  unmakes  many  old  ones  with  ruthless  deter- 
mination. Honora  was  happy,  but  saddest  com- 
plications of  feelings  followed  for  Miss  Seward, 
and  she  and  Mr.  Edgeworth  are  known  to  have 
had  differences  and  estrangements.  When  at 
last  they  met,  some  years  later,  we  read  of  the 
event  in  the  following  letter,  which  describes  the 
Swan's  extreme  sensibility  in  eloquent  terms : 
was  there  ever  a  more  sensational  meeting? 

"  Ah  !  my  dear  Mrs.  Sykes,  you  would  have 
sooth'd  me  with  your  tender  pity  if  you  had 
seen  me  receive  a  message  from  our  servant  last 
Monday  evening.  I  was  sitting  in  my  drawing- 
room  with  a  silly  coxcomb  of  an  officer  who  had 
called  upon  me.  John  opened  the  door  and 
said — '  Madam,    Mr.    and    Mrs.    Edgeworth    are 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD        93 

below  stairs.' — Oh  my  Friend !  I  had  not  the 
least  expectation  of  such  an  event — '  Good  God  ! ' 
I  exclaimed,  and  sunk  back  in  my  chair  more 
dead  than  alive — I  desired  he  would  say  I  was 
out — a  violent  flood  of  tears  reliev'd  me.  The 
macaroni  was  astonished,  but  if  a  thousand  Fops 
had  been  present  I  could  not  have  concealed  my 
emotion.  I  did  not  intend  to  see  them  at  all — 
it  was  an  hour  before  my  aunt  could  prevail 
upon  me  to  go  down,  she  and  my  mother  were 
out  when  they  came.  I  will  reserve  a  particular 
description  of  this,  to  me — heart-rending  scene 
for  the  first  tete-a-tete  I  have  the  pleasure  to 
share  with  you,  since  my  paper  will  not  allow 
me  to  be  circumstantial  noiv. 

*'  They  staid  only  two  days  in  Lichfield,  are 
now  in  London.  The  time  of  their  return  is 
uncertain.  I  have  only  room  to  assure  you  of 
the  affectionate  vivacity  of  all  our  desires  to 
see  you  all.  Our  united  loves  attend  yourself, 
Mr.  Sykes  and  our  young  friends." 

Very  real  anxiety  for  Honora's  health  followed, 
and  one  can  imagine  the  pang  with  which  Miss 
Seward  writes  on  a  subsequent  occasion,  a  year 
or  two  after  this  agonising  meeting  : 


94  FROM   THE   PORCH 

"Mr.  Edgeworth  was  in  Lichfield  last  week, 
very  sprightly  and    happy  with  a   fine  picture 
of  Honora  by  Smart,  drawn  here  two  years  ago, 
but  finished  lately  and  sent  down  to  him  only 
Thursday.     The  day  it  came  he  flew  over  with 
it  to  Lichfield  to  show  it  to  us  all.     The  exulta- 
tion of  his  vanity  to  have  possessed  tlie  original 
of  so  beautiful  a   portrait  absorbed  all  shadow 
of  regret  for  her  danger,  and  it  was  with   the 
utmost  force  that  he  drew  a  transient  veil  over 
the  sunshine  of  his  vivacity  on   being  asked   if 
she   was   not    a   little    better.     I    heard   of    his 
being  in  Lichfield  with  the  picture  before  I  saw 
him,  and  burnt  with  impatience   to  behold   the 
semblance   of  a   face    so   dear.     When   we   met, 
he  had  the  cruelty  to  keep  it  some  minutes  in 
his    hand.     (Two    or  three   words    follow  which 
are  illegible.)     The  picture  is  beautiful,  but  my 
disappointment    was    extreme,    for    it   gives   me 
very  little  idea  of  Honora.     Oh!   That  it   had 
been   a   striking   likeness!     As   it   is,   it    would 
scarcely  be   any  object   of  sufficient  importance 
to  make  me  ask  a  favour  of  a  man  who  has  so 
deeply    injured    me.     In   a    fortnight    he    takes 
Honora  to  Bristol.     If  she  had  gone  thither  last 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         95 

spring,  I  firmly  believe  it  would  have  saved  her. 
Oh,  that  the  gay  heart  of  this  man  could  have 
been  persuaded  to  have  feared  in  time  for  the 
life  of  her  whom  he  .  .  ."  (The  rest  of  the 
letter  is  missing.) 

So  Honora  married  and  died,  and  poor  Anna 
put  up  with  friendships  for  the  rest  of  her  life, 
one  especially  being  paramount.  After  she 
became  celebrated,  she  was  made  much  of  and 
her  head  was  somewhat  turned — and  no  wonder. 
Dr.  Darwin  admired  her  poetry,  Mr.  Saville  was 
her  special  devotee,  Mr.  11.  Sykes  confided  in 
her  sympathy,  Miss  Marianne  came  to  stay — 
and  in  later  years  Scott  himself  travelled  many 
miles  out  of  his  way  to  call  upon  her  in  Lichfield, 
having,  as  we  know,  a  turn  for  authoresses. 

I  have  been  shown  some  letters  written  by 
Miss  Seward  in  1783,  not  to  Mrs.  Sykes  but  to 
a  young  soldier,  Mr.  Hale,  a  friend  of  Major 
Andre's.  Poor  Andre  was  no  more  ;  Honora,  too, 
had  passed  away.  Miss  Seward  was  writing  her 
celebrated  monody  on  Major  Andre  at  the  time, 
and  she  shows  both  feeling  and  discrimination 
when  she  speaks  of  her  sorrow  for  Andre's  cruel 
fate,  and  at  the  same  time  maintains  the  rights 


96  FROM   THE   PORCH 

of  those  on  the  American  side,  who  fought  for 
hberty. 

These  letters,  which  have  been  carefully  copied 
and  noted,  give  a  quotation  from  the  orders  of 
the  day  at  New  York,  October  18,  1783,  for 
providing  mourning  for  Major  Andre's  regiment, 
the  Queen's  Rangers,  to  be  worn  in  memory  of 
an  officer  "  whose  superior  integrity  and  uncom- 
mon ability  did  honour  to  his  country  and  to 
human  nature." 

Miss  Seward  is  warmly  interested,  as  she 
ever  was,  in  this  new  correspondent's  private 
affairs — his  marriage — his  prospects.  She  says 
she  would  gladly  accept  his  wife's  invitation  to 
visit  them,  but  that  she  has  "  a  vestal  duty  to 
perform,  that  of  watching  the  vital  flame  of  an 
aged  parent  who  has  none  but  her."  Only  Miss 
Seward  could  have  thus  expressed  the  fact  of 
her  being  busy  at  home ! 

She  writes  as  usual  of  her  own  concerns  and 
with  tender  love  of  Honora,  and  also  describes 
her  devoted  friendship  for  Mr.  Savile,  the  friend 
for  whom  she  sacrificed  so  much,  but  Dr.  John- 
son's hopeless  illness  and  death  cannot  soften 
Miss  Seward's  aversion  for  him,   and  she  even 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         97 

writes  of  his  "  stern  remains."  No  doubt  John- 
son also  detested  Miss  Seward,  and  perhaps  after 
all  a  little  aversion  is  a  very  rousing  element  in 
life,  and  as  a  rule  does  no  one  very  much  harm. 

The  letters  to  her  friend,  Mrs.  Sykes,  touch 
upon  every  possible  subject.  Neighbours,  politics, 
feelings,  all  are  described  at  length  ;  important 
misunderstandings  as  well  as  tender  realisations 
are  dwelt  upon  in  turn. 

One  of  her  communications  begins  with  a 
somewhat  surprising  announcement  of  her  great 
dislike  to  writing  letters.  (One  cannot  help 
remembering  the  many  volumes  edited  by  Sir 
Walter  Scott.)  Anna  reassures  her  friend's 
diffidence,  whose  pen  (she  modestly  observes) 
is  very  far  indeed  from  being  inferior  to  her 
own,  either  in  readiness,  vivacity  or  elegance. 

Every  week  she  (the  Muse)  has  seven  or  eight 
long  letters  to  answer,  and  nothing  could  inspirit 
her  resolutions  to  devote  so  much  time  to  her 
writing,  but  the  sweet  hope  of  hearing  soon 
again  from  those  about  whom  she  was  so  very 
much  interested. 

"  You,  my  dear  Mrs.  Sykes  (she  exclaims, 
somewhat     touchingly),      are     prosperous     and 


98  FEOM   THE   PORCH 

happy,  and  can  perpetually  tell  me  glad  tidings 
of  yourself  and  all  that  belong  to  you — tidings 
that  shall  be  able  to  steal  the  mourner  from  her 
woes  at  least  for  a  little  time.  .  .  . 

"  Whenever  my  prospects  brighten  (she  con- 
tinues), whenever  cheerfulness,  peace  or  '  hope 
with  eyes  so  fair,'  revisit  my  bosom,  like  your 
more  amiable  friend,  the  sweet  Miss  Foot,  I  will 
tell  you  so,  without  considering  whether  or  not 
you  are  a  letter  in  my  debt." 

Miss  Seward  considers  that  Miss  Foot  "  has  a 
fine  turn  of  thought,"  and  she  quotes  as  an 
instance  a  passage  where  Miss  Foot  desired 
Mrs.  Sykes  "  not  to  look  upon  the  present  which 
she  sends  her  as  an  emblem  of  her  affection,  but 
rather  of  those  agreeable  hours  passed  together, 
resembling  well  the  flower  of  the  fields — as 
sweet,  as  fair,  as  perishable ! ''  Is  it  possible 
that  the  world  has  missed  in  Miss  Foot  a  second 
Miss  Anna  Seward  ? 

The  next  long  and  closely  written  page  is 
taken  up  by  a  transcription  of  a  passage  from 
"  Oscian "  beginning  :  "  The  flower  hangs  its 
heavy  head,  waving  at  times  to  the  gale."  There 
is  also  a  final  allusion  to  Miss  Foot  as  "a  fair 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         99 

enthusiast,  triumphant  over  all  the  pangs  of  strug- 
gling nature  and  sublunary  disappointments." 
Anna  Seward,  Muse  though  she  is,  does  not  rise 
altogether  above  the  pangs  of  human  jealousy. 

Storms  were  in  the  air,  the  devoted  friends 
had  serious  misunderstandings ;  explanations,  re- 
capitulations follow,  running  over  many  pages, 
but  passionate  always. 

"  I  must  regret,  but  I  will  not  resent  your 
silence,  my  dear  Mrs.  Sykes,  while  still,  though 
late,  you  assure  me  that  it  does  not  arise  from 
a  diminution  of  that  friendship  with  which  you 
honour  me — a  blessing  which  I  could  ill  spare 
from  the  scanty  hoard  of  happiness  allotted  to 
me  by  fate ;  resolved  to  be  convinced  that  you 
love  me,  I  give  you  credit  for  the  ingenious 
jocularity  of  your  speech." 

Our  poetess  is  not  quite  convinced,  though 
glad  to  heai-  that  health  and  prosperity  and 
joy  continue  to  diffuse  their  blessings  on  dear 
Westella,  where,  as  she  remarks,  "  The  olive 
branches  increase  in  beauty,  excellence  and 
strength."  Of  one  of  the  children,  Joe,  we  read, 
"  his  perception  is  lively,  his  mind  ingenuous, 
his  person  lovely."     "May  never  the  blight   of 


100  FROM  THE   PORCH 

disease,  the  vapours  of  folly,  or  the  canker  of 
vice  shed  baneful  influence  over  the  children 
of  such  care."  Three  attributes  at  least  are 
generally  necessary  to  every  statement.  We 
presently  come  to  a  fading  page  of  criticism 
concerning  Lord  Chesterfield's  letters  :  "  It  would 
perhaps  have  been  better  for  the  youth  of 
England  if  they  had  never  been  written,  as 
they  tend  to  destroy  that  virtuous,  that  romantic 
enthusiasm  of  youth  where  benevolence  is  fired 
by  generous  credulity,  and  morality  preserved 
by  passionate  affection." 

If  any  occasional  misunderstanding  arises  be- 
tween Miss  Seward  and  Mrs.  Sykes,  it  is  often 
explained  away  by  a  burst  of  eloquence. 

"  So  I  find  Mr.  R.  Sykes  is  entered  at  Trinity 
College  (says  Miss  Seward  to  her  friend).  Oh, 
may  his  conduct  there  and  through  every 
situation  of  life  be  such  as  shall  answer  the 
anxious  wishes  of  his  solicitous  and  indulgent 
parents.  Believe  me,  you  were  mistaken  if  you 
thought  I  supposed  he  has  not  indulgent  parents. 
All  that  I  ever  wished  otherwise  in  either  your 
or  Mr.  Sykes's  conduct  towards  him  was  too  nice 
a   feeling   of  all   his   errors,   and    a  warmth    of 


THE  SWAN   OF  LICHFIELD         10 1 

invective  against  them  to  him,  which  I  knew 
arose  from  an  ardent  desire  to  render  him 
faultless,  but  which  from  my  own  disposition  I 
feared  was  more  likely  to  incense  than  to  reclaim. 
It  is  very  likely  that  I  might  judge  wrong,  and 
very  certain  that  I  had  better  have  suppressed 
my  opinion  than  given  it,  but  I  have  no  power 
of  drawing  a  veil  between  my  heart  and  those 
that  are  dear  to  it.  I  must  hope  and  believe 
that  our  friend  Richard  has  excellent  qualities  ; 
gratitude  perhaps  may  make  me  partial,  yet  I 
confess  I  tremble  for  him — how  very  dangerous 
the  first  steps  into  life  for  a  young  man  of  strong 
passions !  How  numerous  the  snares  which  will 
be  spread  by  the  libertines  to  lure  him  to  their 
dissolute  paths !  .  .  .  I  make  no  doubt  that 
Richard  did  very  much  exaggerate  what  you 
said  of  the  unreality  of  my  regret  to  part  from 
you  all,  but  it  was  not  unreal.  I  never  yet 
knew  hypocrisy,  and  I  had  been  most  ungrateful 
if  I  had  not  felt  grief  to  leave  those  whom  I 
felt  had  been  so  kind  to  me.  Again,  dear  Mrs. 
Sykes,  you  have  entirely  mistaken  my  meaning. 
Good  God !  How  could  you  suppose  that  the 
description  of  parental  tyranny  transcribed  from 


102  FROM   THE   PORCH 

the  Rainhler  was  in  the  least  degree  aimed  at 
you  and  Mr.  Sykes !  You  and  I  both  love 
argument,  and  you  have  often  asserted  to  me 
how  all  parents  must  necessarily  study  their 
children's  happiness,  that  where  misunderstand- 
ings existed  between  parents  and  children,  the 
fault  was  almost  always  in  the  children.  I 
thought  this  a  hard  and  partial  argument,  and 
when  I  met  with  that  Rambler  which  made  so 
much  for  my  side  of  the  question,  that  parents 
were  often  arbitrary  and  unreasonable,  as  chil- 
dren undutiful,  I  could  not  help  transcribing 
it  to  show  that  a  man  of  exalted  sense  and 
deepest  observation  and  long  knowledge  of  the 
human  heart  was  of  my  opinion.  .  .  . 

"The  best  and  purest  kind  of  charity  is 
candour,  that  hopeth  all  things,  with  tender 
sympathy  and  soft  consideration ;  when  we 
consider  the  hopeless  state  of  man,  the  imbe- 
cility of  children,  the  numerous  evils  of  riper 
years,  the  unhappy  force  of  native  and  violent 
passions,  the  racks  of  disease,  the  wounds  of 
oppression,  the  insults  of  contumely,  the  mis- 
representations of  injustice,  and  the  bitter  pangs 
of    inevitable    poverty,    sorrow    that    brings    in 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         103 

insanity,  or  leads  by  slow  steps  to  the  grave, 
when  we  reflect  upon  these  evils  which  may 
some  or  all  be  the  lot  of  every  individual,  how- 
ever gay  and  elate  with  present  prosperity, 
surely  there  is  no  virtue  so  necessary,  so  little 
to  be  dispensed  with,  as  Humanity !  IIovv  are 
Mrs.  Collins's  spirits  ?  Richard  tells  me  Miss 
Collins  is  well." 

What  a  golden  age  must  this  have  been  for 
Lichfield  when  Anna  casually  remarks  in  con- 
clusion : 

"  We  have  had  another  genius  among  us ;  he 
stayed  only  a  week. 

"  Yours  faithfully  and  aflectionately." 

The  various  collateral  items  of  news  which 
the  writer  of  all  these  letters  gives  (outside  the 
description  of  her  own  feelings)  are  interesting 
to  the  dilettante  of  to-day  who  has  made  any 
acquaintance  with  the  age  in  which  Miss  Anna 
Seward  flourished.  Flourishing  is  the  word 
which  undoubtedly  describes  Miss  Seward  in 
1776,  notwithstanding  the  troubles  which  had 
so  lately  fallen  upon  Great  Britain,  and  which 
were  still  gathering,  though  as  yet  the  shadow 
had  not  reached  Lichfield. 


104  FHOM   THE   PORCH 

"  It  is  not  0U7'  Mr.  Day,"  the  sprightly  lady 
says,  "  who  is  going  to  Bengal — no,  no !  Catch 
him  if  you  can  at  receiving  emoluments  from 
Government."  Then  she  alludes  to  the  York 
mail  which  has  been  robbed,  "by  Avhich  Mr. 
Sykes  has  lost  £100,  and  she  has  missed  a  letter 
from  her  dear,  dear  Mrs.  Sykes."  Then  she 
glances  at  Miss  Twig's  amours — rejoices  "  in  the 
happiness  of  her  friends  in  calling  together  their 
olive  branches  round  their  cheerful  table ;  ah, 
long,  very  long,  may  this  pleasure  flourish  and 
increase !  Her  mother  had  made  up  the 
beautiful  cloak,  which  she  allows  Anna  to 
wear  on  Sunday,  not  being  equal  to  church 
herself." 

In  another  letter  written  to  Mr.  Sykes,  the 
husband  of  Mrs.  Sykes,  Miss  Seward  dwells  "  in 
tender  transports  on  the  hope  of  seeing  Mrs. 
Sykes  again,  and  those  other  kind  friends,  who 
have  so  highly  obliged  her "  ;  she  is  writing 
"  with  the  vilest  pen  that  ever  scored,"  she  tells 
him,  but  she  still  continues  to  wield  it,  "though 
night  creeps  on  apace,  and  the  drowsie  hour 
steals  upon  her.  She  would  have  written  before 
to  express  her  gratitude,  but  that  she  had  pro- 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         105 

mised  to  work  Mr.  Charles  Buckeridge  a  waistcoat 
by  the  next  Assembly.  .  .  ." 

II 

The  Bishop's  Palace,  where  the  Sewards  lived 
in  Lichfield,  is  a  beautiful  old  Georgian  dwelling 
on  the  Dean's  Walk,  with  walled  gardens  and 
stately  out-dwellings ;  and  thither,  following 
Honora,  came  somewhere  about  the  year  1776 
little  Marianne  Sykes  as  a  sort  of  pupil  and 
petted  companion.  In  after-days,  when  Marianne 
grew  up,  she  married  Henry  Thornton,  the  well- 
known  philanthropist  and  member  of  Parliament, 
who  was  one  of  the  leaders  of  the  Clapham  Sect, 
and  it  is  her  own  mother's  packet  of  letters 
which  I  received  from  Miss  Marianne  Thornton, 
the  kind  donor. 

Meanwhile  Miss  Seward  writes  to  Mrs.  Sykes, 
Marianne's  mother,  long  pages  of  advice  con- 
cerning education. 

"  Since  you  have  opportunities  at  Hull  of 
having  her  instructed  well  in  French  and  danc- 
ing, I  think  you  will  scarce  persuade  yourselves 
to  send  her  further  from  you.  You  are  perfectly 
capable  of  giving  her  every  other  accomplishment 


106  FROM   THE   PORCH 

except  music,  which  though  ornamental  may 
well  be  spared  amidst  the  liberal  assemblage  of 
other  endowments.  I  have  but  one  reason  for 
wishing  Marianne  to  go  further  from  home  :  it  is 
this — lest  she  should  contract  a  Provincial  tone 
of  voice  ;  that  of  Yorkshire  is  very  peculiar,  and 
few  of  the  genteelest  people  who  have  been 
educated  there  have  been  free  from  it.  There  is 
perhaps  no  outward  grace  so  essential  to  a  young 
lady  as  a  polished  manner  of  speaking.  .  .  . 
Boarding-schools  are  well  in  this  respect  ;  the 
children  being  collected  from  various  counties, 
provinciality  is  soon  confounded  and  destroyed 
in  the  little  Babel." 

A  correspondence  follows  both  before  and  after 
the  arrival  of  little  Marianne  at  the  Bishop's 
Palace.  We  have  the  description  of  her  first 
arrival.  "  At  two  o'clock  she  came,  healthy, 
plump,  and  blooming  as  the  morning ;  she  is 
indeed  a  very  amiable  little  creature — what  a 
benevolent  intention  to  please  at  an  age  when 
most  human  beings  think  only  of  being  pleased. 
She  was  so  kind  as  to  show  me  her  mamma's 
last  letter." 

There  was  a  well-known  school  in  those  days 


THE  SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         107 

kept  by  a  certain  Mrs.  Lataffier,  to  whom,  among 
other  young  maidens,  Maria  Edgeworth  was  at 
one  time  entrusted.  Miss  Sykes,  too,  had  been 
placed  under  her  charge,  and  Miss  Seward 
criticises  this  lady  in  her  correspondence  with 
the  mother : 

"  If  Mrs.  Lataffier  really  sees  nothing  that  is 
uncommonly  amiable  in  Marianne  I  am  sorry  for 
her  want  of  discernment,  I  am  sure  she  has  not 
many  such  children  ;  I  believe  she  is  an  able  and 
judicious  governess,  as  governesses  go,  and  one 
must  not  expect  from  people  more  accustomed 
to  act  than  to  reflect,  the  nice  distinctions  of 
right  and  wrong,  or  that  they  should  have  a 
lively  sensibility  of  modest  worth.  Miss  Sykes 
has  very  quick  comprehension,  an  excellent 
memory,  and  I  have  never  known  a  sweeter 
temper — if  there  is  anything  I  could  wish  in  the 
slightest  degree  otherwise,  it  Is  that  she  had 
rather  more  activity ;  I  think  there  is  a  little 
bias  towards  that  indolence  which  if  indulged 
must  wither  all  accomplishments  in  their  bud, 
but  the  excessive  sweetness  which  adorns  this 
precious  Blossom  will  sufficiently  counteract  all 
the  bad  consequences  of  her  little  and  o^dy  foible. 


108  FROM   THE   PORCH 

You,  my  dear  Mrs.  Sykes,  who  are  so  well  aware 
of  the  torpid  balefuhiess  of  indolence,  will  take 
care  that  our  sweet  Marianne  does  not  waste  the 
seed-time  of  her  youth  without  ample  provision 
for  the  hereafter  harvest." 

Much  correspondence  follows  in  the  same 
style : 

"  I  am  sure  Marianne  will  be  a  very  accom- 
plished woman,  sure  if  she  is  attended  to — if  on 
her  return  from  school,  the  ensuing  five  or  six 
years  are  cultivated  by  a  7'egular  plan  of  studies 
and  employments,  which  nothing  but  absolute 
necessity  suffer  to  interrupt — this,  I  know,  you 
will  take  care  of — and  therefore,  I  dare  be 
assw^ed  that  if  Psyche  lives  and  is  blessed  with 
health  she  will  not  disappoint  your  fondest 
wishes — Mr.  Brown  is  quite  satisfied  with  the 
improvement  she  has  made  in  Music  since  her 
arrival  here — she  has  a  very  pretty  finger  and 
will  certainly  play  well,  with  close  and  attentive 
practice.  As  to  her  reading  English,  it  does 
you  great  credit,  very  feiv  groum  people  read  so 
justly.  I  am  not  sure  that  it  is  possible  for  her 
ever  to  read  oratorically ,  I  think  her  voice  has 
not  sufficient  power  and  variety,  perhaps  her  ear 


THE   SWAN   OF  LICHFIELD        109 

is  7iot  a  nice  one,  as  yoti  observe,  and  then  her 
natural  diffidence  is  against  that  animated  spirit, 
necessary  to  Jine  reading  and  speaking.  This 
was  Honora's  case  in  every  respect ;  she  had  a 
very  quick  and  delicate  ear,  but  her  voice  wanted 
power,  and  she  was  also  too  diffident — yet  she 
read  elegantly,  though  not  pathetically — so  will 
our  dear  girl.  All  the  instruction  on  this  and 
every  other  subject  in  my  poiver  to  give  her,  I 
have  a  pleasure  in  giving.  I  hope  the  dear  girl 
does  not  think  me  a  rigid  monitress,  though 
perhaps  a  little  too  iyidefatigahle,  i.e.  for  that 
tender  indolence,  which  is  often  the  concomitant 
o^  gentle  spirit. 

"The  weather  has  been  so  piercing,  the  ground 
so  slippy,  and  Psyche  seemed  to  have  so  little 
inclination  to  walk  out,  that  I  could  not  find  in 
my  heart  to  venture  her  ;  but  that  she  may  not 
want  exercise,  I  have  procured  a  battledore  and 
shuttlecock,  and  she  plays  in  the  gallery  half- 
an-hour  in  the  morning  and  half-an-hour  after 
dinner.  Mr.  Comber's  ball,  to  which  she  had  a 
card  of  invitation  and  a  partner  procured  for  her, 
was  very  brilliant.  I  never  saw  so  mucli  com- 
pany in  our  Assembly  Room,  except  at  the  races 


110  FROM   THE   PORCH 

— Marianne  was  very  much  admired.  This  Mr. 
Comber  is  a  fop  of  fashion — an  officer  who  was 
quartered  here  last  winter,  took  a  liking  to  the 
place,  and  has  been  in  the  neighbourhood,  chiefly 
with  Lord  Donegal,  all  this  winter.  He  was  the 
Being  who  interrupted  me,  when  I  was  writing 
to  you  last  week.  He  often  comes  here  and 
wearies  me  finely — but,  at  the  Ball,  fops  who 
make  lamentable  coTwpanions  are  often  excellent 
Masters  of  Ceremony. 

"  If  /  had  daughters,  I  would  never  suffer 
them  to  learn  anything  from  Mercenaries,  which 
I  could  teach  them  myself,  for  surely  the  task 
is  most  delightful  when  the  disposition  of  the 
pupil  is  amiable  ;  few  are  so  well  qualified  to 
educate  female  youth,  as  yourself,  my  dear 
Mrs.  Sykes,  in  all  things  which  respect  the 
cultivation  of  the  understanding  and  the  virtues 
— if  Hull  can  supply  you  with  proper  masters  in 
Music,  French,  Drawing,  and  dancing,  I  M'ould 
never  have  wished  you  to  send  your  Beloved 
Child  to  a  school,  but  for  one  reason,  the  danger 
of  her  contracting  the  Provincial  tone  in  speak- 
ing and  reading,  from  the  servants  and  from  her 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         111 

little  brothers ;  if  Molly  Broadley  had  every 
possible  accomplishment,  her  Yorkshire  dialect 
would  for  ever  prevent  her  being  an  elegant 
woman — of  all  externals,  in  my  opinion  a  polished 
and  pleasing  tone  of  voice  is  the  most  material." 

"Saturday  noon,  Lichfd.,  Jan.  A,  1777. 

"  Your  most  kind,  most  welcome  packet,  my 
ever  dear  Mrs.  Sykes,  has  imparted  to  Marianne 
and  to  myself  that  pleasure,  at  once  so  tender 
and  so  lively  which  affectionate  hearts  must 
always  feel  when  the  precious  proofs  of  being 
belov'd  and  esteemed  by  the  objects  of  that 
affection,  pour  the  sweet  tide  of  gratitude  and 
joy  upon  the  mind.  We  have  this  instant 
finished  our  intellectual  feast — Marianne  is 
returned  to  her  Forte  Piano — the  traces  of  the 
latent  joy  still  play  upon  her  countenance — 
Saturday  afternoon  1  was  interrupted  and  robbed 
of  the  hour  which  I  had  dedicated  to  you  by 
a  Coxcomb,  who  has  employed  it  in  edifying- 
orations  upon  running  horses,  the  elegance  of 
gentlemen's  clothes  with  coloured  spangles,  and 
the  absolute  necessity  of  wearing  shoe  buckles 
that   will   touch   the  side  of  the  shoes  on  each 


112  FEOM   THE   PORCH 

side.  We  are  all  going  out  in  an  hour  for  the 
evening — Miss  Sykes  and  I  are  neither  of  us 
dressed.  The  frank  must  set  out  for  Hull  early 
in  the  morning,  so  I  must  not  attempt  to  com- 
ment upon  your  last  letter,  but  hope  to  answer 
it  at  full  next  week !  That  I  might  be  able  to 
say  with  Truth  that  Miss  Sykes's  letter  which 
she  wrote  yesterday  was  tvholly  her  oivn,  I 
have  not  altered  one  syllable — but,  since  it  was 
finished,  I  pointed  out  to  her  a  method  of 
expressing  the  same  sense,  without  using  many 
of  her  words  in  so  frequent  repetition — You  have, 
ere  this,  I  hope,  received  a  sad  hasty  scribble 
which  I  dispatched  for  you  last  Sunday  morning 
— It  will  inform  you  precisely  how  my  sweet 
Pupil  and  I  employ  ourselves — Be  assur'd  her 
mind  is  at  present  pure  as  when  she  left  your 
Guardian  arms ;  nor  art,  nor  pride,  nor  malice 
have  found  the  smallest  harbour — But  time  flies 
— I  dare  not  trust  myself  with  entering  noiv 
upon  so  very  interesting  a  subject,  therefore  will 
only  plight  to  you  my  solemn  promise  that  I 
have  and  shall  continue  to  bear  constantly  in 
mind  the  kind  of  Woman  which  I  know  you  wish 
our  sweet  One  to  be,  and  that  she  shall  hear,  see, 


THE   SWAN   OF    LICHFIELD         113 

and  read  nothing  that  shall  have  the  remotest 
tendency  to  counteract  the  safe  and  quiet  system 
which  you  have  formed  for  her  future  conduct. 
You  wish  her  to  be  adorned  with  all  those 
accomplishments  that  can  render  her  engaging 
and  lovely,  without  endangering  her  peace  of 
mind. — You  had  rather  she  was  gently  humane 
than  passionately  tender — that  her  address  was 
rather  modest  than  brilliant.  Ah  !  I  believe  you 
are  perfectly  right — more  of  this,  and  a  thousand 
other  things  hereafter. — We  are  all  in  good 
health  and  all  attach'd  to  you  and  Mr.  Sykes 
by  Friendship,  Gratitude  and  Love.  Ever  your 
A.  Seward. 

"  P.S. — Mr.  Brown  comes  most  days  to  Miss 
Sykes.  He  was  teaching  her  while  the  Fop  was 
fatiguing  me  this  morning.  Her  improvement 
in  her  Music  since  she  came  here  has  been  I'apid. 
— Mr.  Brown  says  if  she  was  to  be  kept  to 
practise  for  six  more  years  as  much  as  she  is 
at  present  he  would  ansiver  for  her  l)eing  able 
to  play  remarkably  well. 

*'  But  if  Lichfield  agrees  with  her  (the  writer 

continues),  if  the  sweet  girl  finds  it  pleasant  to 

be  with  us,  if  you  and  Mr.  S.  perceive  that  she 

11 


114  FROM   THE   PORCH 

does  not  neglect  her  studies  while  she  is  here, 
ray  mother  and  I  shall  plead  hard  with  you  both 
that  these  shall  not  be  the  last  holidays  that 
we  shall  long  for.  She  and  I  have  agreed  to 
dedicate  the  whole  morning  to  her  music,  her 
reading,  and  a  little  work — the  evening  she  will 
perhaps  generally  be  engaged  in  company  either 
in  my  mother's  parties  or  in  mine ;  this  after- 
noon she  went  with  me  to  Mrs.  Porter's,  where 
we  met  Lady  Smith,  Miss  Vyse,  and  a  good  deal 
more  company ;  her  Ladyship  inquired  much 
after  Mrs.  Sykes  from  our  young  friend.  To- 
morrow she  is  to  go  with  my  mother  and  myself 
to  a  large  Commerce  party  at  Lady  Smith's.  At 
present  she  is,  I  hope,  fast  asleep." 

In  an  undated  letter  which  seems  to  belong 
to  this  time,  Miss  Seward  condoles  on  various 
domestic  anxieties,  saying  she  "  should  have 
thanked  Mrs.  Sykes  amid  the  tenderest  embraces 
for  her  last  most  kind  letter,  if  it  had  not  been 
for  these  anxieties."  She  then  describes  an 
ideal  curate  indeed. 

"My  father  (she  says)  returned  out  of  the 
Peak  three  weeks  ago,  after  residing  there  during 
six,  in   perfect   health   and   very  happy,   having 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         115 

obtained  a  curate  who  is  quite  a  phenomenon 
among  curates — one  of  the  most  accomplished 
and  most  amiable  young  men  that  was  ever 
heard  of,  who  edifies  by  his  virtues,  who  charms 
by  his  oratory,  and  who  fascinates  by  his 
manners,  who  is  a  good  Latin  scholar,  who  writes 
verses  finely,  who  draws  elegantly,  who  speaks 
the  modern  languages  fluently,  who  has  travelled, 
and  who  has  refused  travelling  with  Lord  Balti- 
more's son  upon  a  stipend  of  four  hundred  pounds 
a  year,  and  reserves  this  galaxy  of  virtues, 
talents  and  graces  to  gild  and  enlighten  the 
barren  rocks  and  deep  valleys  of  your  native 
home  and  mine." 

Dr.  Seward,  judging  from  this  description, 
must  have  had  some  of  his  daughter's  enthusiasm 
for  his  friends.  One  cannot  help  remembering 
Coleridge's  elegy  upon  his  death:  " Mr.  Seward, 
Mr.  Seward,  I  trust  you  ai-e  an  angel,  but  you 
were  an  ass  !  " 

In  1780  poor  Major  Andrt^  died.  We  know 
how  his  friends  at  Lichfield  mourned  him.  Miss 
Seward  published  her  "Monody"  in  1781.  It 
made  her  famous,  and  she  wrote   to   her   friend 


116  FROM   THE  PORCH 

in  melancholy  satisfaction  at  the  sympathy  she 
had  met  with  : — 

"  I  enclose  a  poetic  epistle,  which   I  received 
from   an    ingenious   clergyman    at    Shrewsbury, 
whom  I  never  saw  nor  heard  of  till  he  paid  me 
this  compliment.      I   think  his  poem   contained 
some  fine   lines.      The    11th  and  the    12th,   the 
16th  and   those  four  lines  which  allude  to  the 
spear  of  Ithuriel  are  in  the  true  spirit  of  poetry. 
I  send  you  also  a  very  enthusiastic  eulogium  in 
prose    upon    the    '  Monody '    sent    to    me    from 
Courtney  Melmoth.     This  letter  does  honour  to 
the  heart,  whatever  it  may  do  to  the  judgment 
of  its  writer,  evincing  that  it  is  wholly  free  from 
that  hint  of  envy,  which  Pope,  with  perhaps  too 
much  justice,  imputes  to  rival  authors  when  he 
complains   that   they  '  Damn   with  faint  praise.' 
This   gentleman    and    myself    have    more    than 
once  been  rivals  for  the  myrtle  wreath  at  Bath 
Easton.      He    sought   my    correspondence    some 
time  since,  though  we  never  saw  each  other.     I 
send  you  also  a  letter  from  Mr.  Hawkings  Brown, 
a  gentleman   of  considerable   literary  eminence, 
and  of  whose  praise  I  am  not  a  little  proud — 
the  more  so  as  his  politics  are  against  my  poem ; 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD        117 

so  are  also  Courtney  Melmoth's.  The  English 
Chronicle  and  Universal  Evening  Post  for  Thurs- 
day, March  29  (she  continues),  honours  the 
'  Monody '  on  Major  Andre  with  the  amplest 
praise.  You  will  smile  at  the  enthusiastic  warmth 
of  Courtney  Melmoth's  encomiums,  yet  I  think 
their  ingenuity  will  make  you  some  amends  for 
partiality  which  is  but  too  evident," 

Further  correspondence  shows  that  Lichfield 
was  not  the  only  scene  of  Miss  Seward's  triumphs  ; 
she  travelled  for  relaxation,  she  visited  London, 
Chatsworth,  Westella,  Bath  Easton,^  her  native 
village  of  Eyam,  where  at  least  she  had  hoped 
for  rest  and  retirement ;  "  but  this  was  not  to 
be  allowed.  We  entered  my  native  walls  at 
four  o'clock  on  Tuesday.  Several  of  our  poor 
neighbours    shed    kind    tears   of  joy   to    see    me 

'  In  Seeley's  Life  of  Mixs  Jhirney  there  is  iin  amusing'  mention 
of  the  assembhige  at  Bath  Easton  :  "  A  chief  topic  of  conversation 
at  this  time  in  Bath  was  Lady  Miller's  vase  at  Bath  Easton." 
Horace  Walpole  mentions  this  vase,  and  the  use  to  which  it  was 
put :  "  They  hold  Parnassus  Fair  every  Thursday,  give  out  Rhymes 
and  Themes,  and  all  the  tiux  at  Bath  contend  for  the  prizes.  A 
Roman  vase  dressed  with  pink  ribbons  and  myrtles  receives  the 
poetry,  which  is  drawn  out  every  festival.  Six  judges  of  these 
Olympic  Games  retire  and  select  the  brightest  composition." 
Fanny  Burney's  own  comments  on  the  High  Priestess  are  severe  : 
"  Her  habits  are  bustling,  her  air  is  mock-important,  and  her 
manners  very  inelegant."' 


118  FHOM   THE   POBCH 

again ;  they  set  the  bells  a-ringing  in  compli- 
ment to  me,  so  I  was  told. 

"  Heavens,  how  little,  how  deplorably  little, 
retirement  has  it  afforded  me !  But  however  I 
may  wish  for  solitude,  my  mind,  though  fatigued 
with  attention  to  company,  is  perhaps  much 
more  unfit  to  feed  on  thoughts  that  voluntary 
move." 

During  her  visit  to  London,  Miss  Seward  tells 
her  correspondent  how  she  was  "  prevented  by 
illness  from  accepting  a  number  of  pressing 
invitations  to  all  the  most  elegant  and  fashion- 
able amusements."  Her  friends  have  written 
to  her  father  to  request  a  promise  of  permitting 
her  to  pass  some  weeks  in  London  in  the  spring, 
but  she  says,  though  he  has  consented,  "I  do 
not  much  indulge  myself  with  hopes,  his  health 
is  so  very  precarious  and  my  own  so  far  from 
good." 

Miss  Seward  adds  that  she  "  would  enclose 
some  of  her  London  friends'  letters  if  they  did  not 
express  such  unbounded  partiality  for  herself." 

She  not  only  describes  the  scenes  she  enjoys  : 
she  dwells  upon  the  characteristics  of  her  com- 
panions ;    one    of  her    friends   she    writes   of  as 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         119 

"  light,  active,  well  made  without  being  dis- 
agreeably thin,  with  the  air  not  only  of  a 
gentleman,  but  of  a  man  of  fashion  though  with 
unpowdered  hair.  His  hair,  a  fine,  light  shining 
brown,  is  long  and  flows  carelessly  down  his 
shoulders."  Miss  Seward  does  not  altogether 
approve  of  another  habitue,  Mr.  Cunningham ; 
her  taste  "  demands  some  shaded  features  in  the 
mind,  some  Penserosa  tints  in  the  manner  "  ;  also 
"  his  voice  is  a  little  nasal  owing  perhaps  to  his 
having  spoken  so  much  French  in  his  rambles  over 
the  Continent.  No  news  from  Lichfield  (she 
continues).  Charles  Buckeridge  is,  I  suppose,  so 
engrossed  with  the  pleasure  of  a  young  growing 
attachment  as  to  find  no  leisure  for  the  cares 
and  attentions  of  colder  friendship."  He  seems 
to  have  forgotten  the  embroidered  waistcoat. 

Another  friend  of  Miss  Seward  is  "a  gentle- 
man of  great  worth,  some  taste  for  the  classics, 
tender  and  fervent  afiection  but  without  the 
graces,  tall  and  thin,  yet  awkward ;  his  fea- 
tures have  a  sorrowful  stiffness  and  he  wears 
a  wig.  Now  pray  do  not  fancy  he  is  in  love 
with  me,  for  if  you  do,  you  will  be  quite  mis- 
taken.     The    folks    here    (she    continues)    have 


120  FROM   THE  PORCH 

married  us  already  ;  but  never,  never  will  their 
predictions  be  accomplished."  It  is  astonishing 
to  Miss  Seward  "  that  women  dare  venture  to 
marry  unsusceptible  of  passionate  partiality  for 
their  husbands,  without  which  that  state  must 
be  miserable,  at  best  insipid,  for  ever  excluding 
each  dearer,  sweeter  hope." 

In  a  subsequent  letter  she  alludes  to  the 
engagement  of  Thomas  Day,  the  author  of  Sand- 
fo7'd  and  Merton  and  Miss  Milnes,  the  charming 
heiress,  who  consented  to  share  his  life,  his 
cranks,  his  oddities,  his  many  efforts  (so  ungrate- 
fully received)  for  the  good  of  humanity. 

"When  I  was  in  town  (says  Miss  Seward)  I 
found  there  was  indubitably  a  love  affair  between 
Miss  Milnes  and  Mr.  Day,  but  it  was  then,  and 
it  is  still,  my  opinion  that  he  will  do  by  her  as 
by  all  his  former  mistresses — talk  her  out  of  her 
courage ;  he  refines  too  much  and  has  contracted 
an  opinion  from  (as  he  thinks)  experience,  that 
women  are  in  general  contemptibly  unstable. 
I  lately  met  with  two  ladies  who  knew  her 
very  well.  They  tell  me  never  woman  was  so 
changed,  that  she  has  broken  off  almost  all  her 
female  friendships,  sees  very  little  company,  and 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         121 

has  lost  her  vivacity  ;   tell  me  if  you  know  any- 
thing of  all  this  ?  " 

Life  is  certainly  very  full  of  possibilities. 
Thomas  Day  was  young  no  longer,  he  had  never 
yet  mastered  the  art  of  dancing,  nor  of  living 
like  anybody  else.  He  had  failed  to  win  the 
afiections  of  Honora  and  Elizabeth  Sneyd,  both 
of  whom  he  admired  in  turn.  (It  was,  as  we 
know,  to  please  Elizabeth  he  tried  so  hard  to 
learn  dancing  from  a  Parisian  master.)  The 
orphan  girls,  educated  with  a  view  to  his  choosing 
eventually  between  them,  had  settled  for  them- 
selves in  their  own  rank  of  life,  and  were  hand- 
somely portioned  by  him.  The  days  seemed 
solitary  and  clouding  over  for  the  good  and 
conscientious  man,  when  he  met  the  amiable 
Miss  Milnes,  of  whose  genuine  womanly  feeling 
there  can  be  no  doubt.  We  have  all  read  of 
their  ha})py  honeymoon  upon  Hampstead  Heights, 
looking  across  the  lovely  distant  weald  towards 
the  sunsets  which  Turner  loved.  Thomas  Day's 
kind  heart  would  have  been  gladdened  could 
he  have  foreseen  the  beautiful  garden  city  that 
was  to  arise  in  time,  following  upon  beautiful 
visions. 


122  FKOM     THE   PORCH 

in 

Happy  sentiment  such  as  Thomas  Day's  was 
not  for  Anna  Seward,  but  much  that  was  happy 
and  good  fell  to  her  share.  Friendship  was  hers, 
fame  beyond  her  deserts,  a  competence,  a  warm 
and  generous  heart.  There  is  one  episode  in 
her  life  which  she  fully — too  fully  perhaps — 
discusses  with  her  confidante ;  it  is  difficult  not 
to  admire  the  courage  and  constancy  she  showed 
to  this  fanciful  infatuation,  facing  opposition 
from  every  quarter,  and  only  thinking  of  the 
one  person  she  so  esteemed  ;  we  must  also  sym- 
pathise with  the  dismay  of  her  father  and  her 
friends,  unable  to  dissuade  her  from  a  desperate, 
hopeless  devotion  to  an  unfortunate  gentleman, 
who  already  possessed  a  wife — a  violent  woman 
— living  away  from  him.  He  was  "the  principal 
singer  in  Lichfield  Cathedral,"  as  Mr.  Lucas  tells 
us,  and  Miss  Seward  was  foolish  "  even  to  the 
extent  of  purchasing  a  house  for  Mr.  Saville,  and 
defying  that  '  aged  nurseling '  her  father.  Had 
Miss  Seward  been  the  kind  of  sinner  that  those 
who  ostracised  her  affected  to  think,"  her  bio- 
grapher continues,  "  she  would  not  have  been  s» 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         123 

free  with  the  praises  of  her  '  Giovanni '  in  all  her 
letters,  no  matter  to  whom  they  were  written," 

Miss  Seward  opens  out  her  very  inmost  heart 
to  Mrs.  Sykes,  who  seems  to  have  tried  to 
remonstrate. 

''My  tender,  unabating  and  hopeless  affection 
(the  Swan  declares)  is  precisely  what  it  was ; 
to  converse  sometimes  with  the  most  amiable  of 
created  beings  makes  up  the  sum  total  of  my 
happiness — a  scanty,  scanty  store — the  rest  of 
my  days  are  passed  in  uninterrupted  wishes  to 
prolong  and  to  restore  those  fleeting  moments, 
surrounded  as  they  are  with  danger  and  in- 
quietude ;  he  is  sincere,  and  faithful,  and  good. 
He  has  lately  had  an  offer  of  great  emolument  in 
his  profession  from  the  Bishop  of  Kildare,  if  he 
would  go  to  Dublin.  He  has  rejected  it.  Do 
not  chide,  do  not  deplore  this  rejection,  my 
sweet  Mrs.  Sykes,  the  total  separation  would 
have  broken  both  our  hearts.  He  is  at  least  no 
selfish,  no  summer-day  friend ;  favour  and  for- 
tune cannot  bribe  him  to  forsake  me. 

"Has  the  translation  of  Petrarch's  works 
reached  you  yet?  They  are  charming  even  in 
the  translation — how  I  revere,  how  I  idolise  the 


124  FROM   THE   PORCH 

memory  of  that  man — how  commiserate  his  situa- 
tion— passionately  attached  to  his  Laura  for 
nineteen  years,  and  mourning  over  her  grave  till 
the  last  hour  of  his  life;  spotless  and  amiable 
constancy,  triumphant  over  every  opposition  of 
cruel  fate!  She  was  married  to  another  at  the 
time  he  first  beheld  her,  and  she  wore  the  fatal 
chain  till  the  last  moment  of  her  existence ;  she 
died  of  the  plague  on  the  same  day  of  the 
month,  as  in  the  year  on  which  Petrarch  first 
beheld  her  nineteen  years  before.  ...  I  con- 
ceived a  strong  and  early  prejudice  in  favour 
of  Petrarch  from  Lord  Lyttelton's  '  Monody,' 
which  I  could  say  by  heart  at  twelve  years 
old.  Little  did  I  then  imagine  that  my  fate 
would  be  so  similar  to  Petrarch's." 

Lord  Lyttelton  thus  apostrophises  Petrarch  : 

"  Arise,  O  Petrarch,  from  the  Elysian  bowers 

With  never  fading  beauties  crowned,   and  fragrant  with 

ambrosial  flowers, 
Where  to  thy  Laura  thou  again  art  joined  ;  arise,  and  hither 

bring  the  silver  lyre, 
Tuned  by  thy  skilful  hand  to  the  soft  notes  of  elegant  desire, 
With  which  o'er  many  a  land  was  spread  the  fame  of  thy 

disastrous  love. 
To  me  resign  the  vocal  shell,"  &c.,  &c 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         125 

Tlie  quotation  ends  up  by  calling  upon  rough 
mountain  oaks  and  desert  rociis  to  be  moved 
to  pity. 

Poor  Miss  Seward  seems  in  the  like  sad  mood  ; 
she  concludes  by  saying  that  "  sweet  Mrs.  Colt- 
man's  spirits  are  also  very  much  afflicted,"  and 
there  the  page  breaks  oif. 

"I  do  not  take  your  solicitations  ill,  but  it 
is  not  ill  my  power  to  comply  with  them  (she 
writes  again).  The  Dean  did  make  an  offer  of 
continuing  to  Saville  the  income  of  his  place  in 
this  church,  if  he  would  remove  from  Lichfield  ; 
but  the  Dean  is  extremely  old,  and  he  can  only 
engage  for  this  during  his  life.  Saville  knew  I 
could  not  bear  a  total  separation,  and  sent  an 
absolute  refusal  to  listen  to  the  proposal  before 
it  was  even  made. — It  is  true  he  has  offered  to 
leave  Lichfield  if  I  could  make  myself  easy,  not 
for  his  own  sake,  for  he  assures  me  that  it 
would  cost  him  his  own  life,  and  I  am  sure  it 
would  cost  me  mine.  Thei-e  is  no  evil  can 
happen  to  me  so  heavy  and  insupportable  as 
the  knowledge  that  in  all  human  probability 
I  shall  never  behold  him  more.  I  have  thought 
deeply  upon  this  subject,  and  can  never  be  per- 


126  FROM   THE   POECH 

suaded  that  it  is  my  duty  to  renounce  the 
sight  of  him,  and  those  little  transient  con- 
versations we  sometimes  have,  or  that  there 
would  be  any  virtue  in  doing  it,  therefore  I 
could  never  expect  the  reward  you  mention  of 
Heaven  for  bringing  such  insupportable  torture 
upon  myself;  even  if  I  believed  that  Providence 
made  all  worthy  people  happy  here,  which  that 
it  does  '}iot,  every  day's  experience  evinces. 
You  ask  me  if  I  am  so  selfish  that,  being  pre- 
cluded happiness  myself,  I  can  find  no  comfort 
in  promoting  that  of  others?  I  am  not  selfish, 
but  when  I  have  totally  lost  the  very  sight  of 
him  in  whose  dear  ideal  my  soul  only  lives, 
I  should  be  from  that  moment  incapable  of 
comfort  or  distraction.  My  dear,  dear  Honora 
would  look  upon  my  death  as  the  very  worst 
evil  that  could  happen  to  me.  She  knows  this 
must  be  my  portion  if  he  leaves  me  utterly, 
therefore  she  does  not  urge  it.  I  love  Saville 
for  his  virtues  ...  he  cannot  be  my  husband, 
but  no  law  of  earth  or  heaven  forbids  that  he 
should  be  my  friend,  and  debars  us  from  the 
liberty  of  conversing  together  while  that  con- 
versation  is  innocent.     The  world  has  no  right 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         127 

to  suppose  it  otherwise ;  if  it  will  be  so  unjust 
we  cannot  help  it.  Its  severest  censure  we 
should  both  look  upon  as  a  less  misfortune  than 
that  of  seeing  each  other  no  more.  Thank  you 
for  endeavouring  to  guard  my  dear  Mrs.  Colt- 
man's  mind  from  receiving  ill  impressions  of 
me,  but  I  am  afraid  your  kind  care  has  been 
in  vain. 

"  Adieu,  my  dear  Mrs.  Sykes,  adieu  !  " 
One  very  melancholy  page,  undated,  unsigned, 
gives  us  a  further  insight  into  the  troubles  of 
the  poor  Muse's  life  at  that  time,  and  of  the 
price  she  at  any  rate  had  to  pay  for  emulating 
Petrarch,  who  does  not  seem  to  have  suffered 
in  the  same  way. 

"  I  know  there  are  a  set  of  people  in  Lichfield 
(she  says)  who  endeavour  to  injure  me  by  every 
means  in  their  power  ;  the  natural  malignity  of 
mankind  furnishes  them  with  ample  means  of 
doing  so ;  my  father's  conduct  in  caressing  these 
people  aids  their  mischief,  and  stamps  some 
colour  of  credit  upon  their  thousand  falsehoods. 
I  am  not  angry  at  the  credulity  of  the  indiffer- 
ent, but  in  those  who  have  professed  themselves 
my  friends,  and  who  have  every  reason  to  believe 


128  FROM   THE   PORCH 

me  incapable  of  vileness,  with  whatever  indis- 
creet fervour  I  may  attach  myself,  such  credulity 

is  injurious  and  highly   unjust.     Mr.   was 

by  no  means  civil  to  me  when  I  was  last  at 
Westella,  but  of  absolute  personal  affront  I  had 
no  reason  to  complain,  as  you  say,  until  we  met 
at  Keddleston.  .  .  .  Resentful  I  am,  but  not 
malicious  (continues  the  poor  soul),  though  few 
have  received  more  or  deeper  injuries  than 
myself ! " 

Into  this  description  of  Miss  Seward's  feelings 
comes  -a  curious  item  of  news  casually  alluded 
to.  "It  is  a  week  since  this  long  letter  was 
begun,"  she  continues;  "the  interval  has  con- 
firmed the  news  of  Jones's  ^  depredations  in  Hull 
Harbour.  Breakfasting  at  Lady  Gresley's  last 
Saturday — I  saw  Sir  George  Bromley,  who  con- 

'  It  was  in  1778  that  Paul  Jones  was  making  his  raids  upon  the 
coast  of  England.  The  following  is  an  extract  from  the  Westminster 
Ga::ette  of  June  18,  1909  :— 

JOHN  PAUL  JONES'S  LOG-BOOK. 

New  York,  Thursday. — The  interesting  announcement  comes 
from  Boston  that  the  log-book  of  the  Ranger,  which  was  com- 
manded by  Captain  .John  Paul  .Jones,  has  just  been  discovered  in 
that  city.  The  log-book  is  almost  entirely  in  the  handwriting  of 
the  famous  privateer,  and  forms  a  most  valuable  addition  to  the 
few  relics  now  existing  of  the  man  who  wrought  such  enormous 
damage  to  British  commerce  during  the  War  of  Independence. 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD       129 

firmed  the  report — I  hope  Mr.  Sykes  ana  you 
have  suffered  no  material  injury,"  She  then 
immediately  returns  to  her  own  feelings. 

She  is  delicate,  she  says,  of  intruding  upon 
any  person  either  her  company  or  her  letters ; 
her  books  and  her  needles  have  no  ears  to 
imbibe  malicious  reports.  "  I  can  calmly  live 
with  them,"  she  says,  "if all  the  world  should 
fly  me."  Some  music  and  a  hearing- trumpet 
were  sent  by  Miss  Seward  to  old  Mrs,  Johnson 
of  Lichfield,  and  had  procured  a  "  kind  letter 
of  much  more  acknowledgment  than  the  trifles 
merited."  But  she  gives  a  melancholy  list  of 
all  the  people  who  avoid  her,  headed  by  the 
Sneyds,  "  most  cruel  fact  of  all." 

"It  is  certain  that  Mr.  Edge  worth  has  ex- 
tinguished all  regard  for  us  in  the  breast  of  his 
wife,  my  tenderness  for  whom  (she  adds)  was 
one  of  the  ^earliest  habits  of  my  mind  and  can 
never,  never  be  dissolved.  When  the  sun  is 
set  in  the  horizon,  and  the  twilight  but  faintly 
bears  the  traces  of  departed  radiance,  my  imagi- 
nation loves  to  trace  the  form  of  the  clouds  into 
a  resemblance  of  the  plains  around  Westella ; 
sometimes   a   line    of   light   dividing    two    dark 


130  FROM  THE  POECH 

clouds  presents  a  lively  picture  of  that  river  '  the 
long  lustre  of  whose  silver  line,"  &c.  &c. 

Her  former  admirers  are  naturally  the  most 
severe  critics  concerning  her  feelings,  and,  as 
she  observes,  it  is  "  indeed  very  hard  to  have 
Mr.  Porter  and  a  parcel  of  indifferent  spectators' 
opinions  taken  upon  the  state  of  my  heart,  rather 
than  my  own  declaration  on  the  subject.  Are 
not  people  for  ever  imputing  attachments  to  all 
single    people    of  different    sexes   who    converse 

together  ?     (Poor  Miss  Seward  !)     Mr. (she 

says)  chose  to  amuse  himself  with  the  enthu- 
siastic credulity  and  exalted  ideas  of  friendship 
which  he  discovered  to  be  the  leading  features 
of  my  disposition.  .  .  .  He  does  not  plead  any 
falsehood  or  ill-treatment  received  from  me — 
had  he  any  right  to  pass  from  the  extreme  of 
professions  of  an  amity  which  should  never 
know  change  to  that  of  cruel  scorn  and  un- 
merited insolence  upon  the  report  of  others? 
From  them  he  learnt  that  my  attachment  to 
Mr.  Saville  was  unalterable ; — that  I  would  not 
renounce  his  correspondence  or  society,  the  right 
of  possessing  his  friendship  which  had  never 
been  forfeited  by  guilt.  .  .  .  Revengeful  I  have 


THE   SWAN   OF   LICHFIELD         131 

severely  found  Mr. .     He  says  he  has  only 

traduced  me  to  Lady  Etherlngton,  Mrs.  Moses, 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Bourne,  Mr.  and  Miss  Wilberforce 
and  the  Collinses.  Mr.  Eobinson,  known  by  the 
name  of  the  Vicar,  accused  me  in  public  com- 
pany, and  in  proof  of  the  fact  mentioned  that 
I  received  enormous  packets  from  Mr.  Saville, 
and  had  been  continually  writing  to  him  while 
I  was  in  your  family. — You  see,  dear  Madam, 
of  how  much  mischief  to  my  fame  and  peace 
have  been  these  unprovoked  invectives,  and 
surely  it  was  most  ungenerous  to  mention  as 
a  proof  of  criminality  the  long  letters  I  invoked 
and  received." 

It  must  have  been  as  an  amende  honorable 
for  all  the  "  severely  revengeful "  gossip  with 
which  Lichfield  had  once  echoed,  that  the  Dean 
and  Chapter  allowed  Miss  Seward — when  Saville 
died  in  1803 — to  put  up  the  "hundred  pound" 
monument  she  tells  us  of  to  his  memory — "  the 
beautiful  antique  urn"  she  describes,  with 
"  the  column  of  smoke  which  ascends  from  it, 
emblematic  of  exhaling  life."  When  she  herself 
was  dying  slie  begged  to  be  laid  beside  her 
faithful   friend   in   the   vault  on    the    south  side 


132  FEOM   THE   PORCH 

of  Lichfield  Cathedral,  but  this  wish  was  dis- 
regarded, and  she  rests  with  her  parents.  The 
guide-book  of  those  days  stated  that  a  Mr, 
Walter  Scott  wrote  the  lines  commemorating 
her  filial  piety. 

That  same  Walter  Scott,  in  a  letter  to  Sir 
George  Beaumont,  says :  "I  had  a  letter  from 
Wordsworth  the  other  day  on  an  odd  eno'  sub- 
ject. When  we  went  down  to  the  country 
together  in  1805,  Miss  Wordsworth  thinks  they 
went  with  me  to  wait  on  Miss  Seward  at  Lich- 
field. Wordsworth  contends  they  did  not  see 
her,  and  I,  the  referee,  am  unable  to  settle  the 
point.  Such  is  human  evidence  !  "  But  we  have 
Miss  Seward  writing  to  Carey,  the  translator 
of  Dante,  in  May  1807:  "On  Friday  last  the 
positively  great  Walter  Scott  came  like  a  sun- 
beam to  my  dwelling," 

Something  remains  to  be  said  of  that  scene 
where  among  many  consolations  the  Swan  of 
Lichfield  sung  her  melodious  Lament. 

The  Cathedral  stands  serene  and  beautiful 
on  its  rising  ground.  It  is  a  century  older 
than  Westminster  Abbey  itself;  the  quaint 
streets  lead  up   to  the  Close,  and  to  Johnson's 


THE  SWAN  OF   LICHFIELD         133 

market-place,  which  can  scarcely  have  changed 
since  his  day.  The  Bishop's  Palace  dominates 
the  green,  among  beautiful  lights  and  shades 
and  distant  aspects.  Near  by  broad  waters 
reflect  the  banks  beyond  which  Stowe  House 
still  stands  among  its  cedar  trees,  and  the 
gardens  of  rose,  and  avenues  of  hollyhock,  all 
seeming  to  point  to  the  threefold  spires  of  the 
Cathedral.  The  owner  of  Stowe  House  was 
once  Thomas  Day,  who  benevolently  ruled  there, 
trying  his  experiments  in  sealing-wax  on 
Sabrina's  arms,  and  of  tar  water  for  the  benefit 
of  Maria  Edgeworth's  eyes.  Hither  he  brought 
her  father,  Richard  Edgeworth,  and  urged  him 
to  follow  up  his  courtship.  Hither  came  beauti- 
ful Honora  after  her  marriage ;  Johnson  and 
Boswell  have  supped  in  the  old  arched  dining- 
hall  of  Stowe  House  ;  Anna  Seward  herself  must 
have  trod  this  classic  ground — one  can  almost 
see  them  all  once  more. 

Every  day  one  reads  of  meaningless  appari- 
tions and  passing  visions.  How  much  more  to 
be  realised  and  welcomed  are  the  presentations 
of  loving  kindnesses  not  past,  of  fancy  and  fun 
and    noble    enthusiasm    not    over !     It    was    to 


134  FROM   THE   POKCH 

witness  no  witchcraft,  no  raising  of  shadows, 
that  we  all  assembled  at  the  old  hall  at  Lich- 
field on  September  15,  1909.  The  Mayor  and 
Corporation,  the  reporters,  the  Bishop  and 
Chapter,  the  townspeople,  all  were  there,  to  hear 
of  Samuel  Johnson  once  more,  and  in  some 
mysterious  way  all  were  moved,  responding  at  the 
same  moment  to  the  generous  vibration  which 
affected  the  orator  Lord  Rosebery,  and  his 
charmed  listeners,  when  he  spoke  to  them  of  the 
great  man  who  had  once  dwelt  in  the  old  city, 
and  who  for  the  moment  was  present  again. 

The  Swan  of  Lichfield  did  not  belong  to  the 
great ;  she  was  not  of  the  order  of  Johnson 
and  his  compeers ;  but  among  all  her  absurdities 
and  exaggerations  a  true  note  of  human  feeling 
exists  in  her  letters  and  poems  which  will  per- 
haps affect  those  who  may  not  study  her  works, 
yet  who  cannot  but  recognise  her  warm-hearted 
sympathies,  from  which  Johnson  and  Mr.  Edge- 
worth  alone  were  excepted. 


MRS.    JOHN    TAYLOR,   OF    NORWICH 

[This  paper  was  published  in  Macmillau's  Magazine  some 
years  before  Mrs.  Ross  brought  out  her  most  intcrestiitg  history 
of  Three  Generations  of  English   Women.] 

I 

In  the  earliest  years  of  the  present  century, 
when  Norwich  was  in  its  ascendant  and  giving 
its  intellectual  supper-parties ;  when  the  learned 
Dr.  Sayers  was  sitting  for  his  likeness  to  Opie ; 
when  Mrs.  Barbauld  had  retired  from  Palgrave 
to  the  suburbs  of  London ;  when  Elizabeth 
Gurney  and  her  beautiful  sisters,  no  longer 
galloping  about  the  country  in  their  riding- 
habits  and  red  boots,  were  beginning  their 
married  lives ;  when  little  Harriet  Martineau, 
as  a  child,  was  wandering  round  Castle  Hill  and 
trembling  in  terror  at  the  depths  below,  at  the 
sound  of  the  sticks  falling  with  dull  thuds  upon 
the  feather-beds  which  the  careful  housewives 
of  Norwich  were  beating  in  their  doorways — 
in    these    pre-eventful    times   there   lived    in   a 

135 


136  FROM   THE   PORCH 

house,  not  very  far  from  Castle  Hill,  a  friend 
of  Mrs.  Barbauld's,  a  quiet  lady,  Mrs.  John 
Taylor  by  name,  whose  home  was  the  resort 
of  many  of  the  most  cultivated  men  of  the  day, 
and  whose  delightful  companionship  was  justly 
prized  and  valued  by  them.  People  used  to  say 
it  was  well  worth  a  journey  to  Norwich  to  spend 
an  evening  with  Mrs.  John  Taylor.  She  was 
Mackintosh's  friend ;  she  was  Mrs.  Barbauld's 
dearest  friend ;  in  after  days  John  Austin  was 
her  son-in-law ;  John  Mill  and  Charles  Austin 
were  her  intimates.  Her  life  was  spent  in  the 
simplest  fashion.  She  stayed  at  home,  she 
darned  with  wool,  she  read  philosophy  and 
poetry,  she  spoke  her  mind  and  she  thought 
for  herself,  while  she  stitched,  and  marketed, 
and  tended  her  children. 

She  was  a  type  of  a  high-bred  simple  race  of 
women,  perhaps  more  common  in  those  days 
than  now.  To  some  people  seven  children  and 
limited  means  might  seem  a  serious  obstacle  to 
high  mental  culture,  but  Mrs.  Taylor  and  her 
friends  were  of  a  different  way  of  thinking ; 
they  were  not  ashamed  of  being  poor,  of  attend- 
ing to  the  details  of  life  ;  they  were  only  ashamed 


MKS.  JOHN  TAYLOR,  OF   NORWICH    137 

of  being  shabby  in  spirit,  of  mean  aspirations, 
of  threadbare  slovenly  interests.  The  seven 
children,  reared  in  a  wholesome  and  temperate, 
yet  liberal-minded  atmosphere,  went  their  ways 
in  after  life,  well  prepared  for  the  world,  fully 
portioned  with  those  realities  and  impressions 
which  are  beyond  silver  and  gold.  The  two 
daughters,  Susan  and  Sarah,  both  married. 
Sarah  was  Mrs.  Austin,  the  translator  of  R-anke, 
of  the  Story  Without  an  End,  which  children 
have  not  yet  ceased  to  read,  the  mother  of  Lady 
Duff  Gordon,  whose  name  is  also  well  remembered. 
Susan,  the  elder  daughter,  became  the  wife  of 
Dr.  Reeve,  and  the  mother  of  Mr.  Henry  Reeve, 
the  editor  of  the  Edinburgh  Rcvieiv.  It  was  by 
the  kindness  of  Mr.  Henry  Reeve  that  the  writer 
was  allowed  to  read  many  of  the  letters  from 
Mrs.  Taylor  to  her  early  friend,  to  her  daughters, 
to  Dr.  Reeve,  her  son-in-law,  the  father  of  Henry 
Reeve — the  faded  writing  flows  in  a  still  living 
stream  of  interest,  solicitude,  affection,  anxiety, 
and  exhortation,  flowing  on  in  even  lines,  and 
showing  so  much  of  that  mingled  force,  of  imagi- 
nation and  precision,  which  goes  to  make  up  the 
literary  faculty. 


138  FROM   THE   PORCH 

The  letters  run  back  to  the  days  before  Mrs. 
Taylor's  marriage,  and  give  a  vivid  picture  of 
a  young  lady's  impressions  of  life  a  century  ago ; 
for  it  is  more  than  a  hundred  years  since  Miss 
Susanna  Cook  sat  down  to  describe  what  she 
calls  a  "jaunt  to  London,"  and  to  recapitulate 
all  the  crowding  interests  and  delights  of  1776 
for  the  benefit  of  a  confidante,  Miss  Judith  Dixon, 
somewhat  her  junior  in  years  and  experience, 
and  living  tranquilly  far  removed  from  the 
metropolis  in  St.  Andrew's  Broad  Street  in 
Norwich. 

Miss  Susanna  dips  her  pen  and  traces  her 
pretty  lines,  and  the  yellow  pages  seem  tinted 
still  by  the  illumination  of  these  bygone  youth- 
ful shining  mornings  and  evenings,  and  brilliant 
anticipations  and  realisations,  to  say  nothing  of 
the  dazzling  lamps  of  Vauxhall,  which  place 
Miss  Cook  does  not  fail  to  visit.  The  parcel  of 
happy  people  (so  she  describes  her  party)  con- 
sists of  the  young  lady  herself,  of  a  "  lively 
young  divine "  and  his  wife  and  three  sisters ; 
nor  can  Miss  Susanna  find  too  much  praise 
for  the  most  amiable  girls  she  ever  met;  for 
the  evenings  fine  beyond  expression ;  for  Vaux- 


MRS.   JOHN  TAYLOR,  OF   NORWICH   139 

hall  itself,  which  she  had  always  admired,  but 
which  appears  to  her  more  enchanting  than 
ever.  Let  us  hope  that  the  young  ladies,  the 
great-great-granddaughters  of  Miss  Cook  and 
her  companions,  still  write  in  the  same  spirit 
and  find  equally  balmy  sights  at  the  Earl's  Court 
Exhibitions,  the  White  City  and  elsewhere,  as 
well  as  lively  young  divines  to  escort  them.  But 
this  is  perhaps  hoping  too  much,  for  I  am  told 
the  race  no  longer  exists.  Nothing,  however, 
not  even  a  jaunt  to  London,  is  absolutely  per- 
fect, either  in  this  age,  or  in  the  last.  "  Pity 
me ! "  writes  the  young  lady,  "  Garrick  played 
Hamlet  at  Drury  Lane  last  night,  and  we 
might  as  well  have  attempted  to  move  St. 
Paul's  as  to  get  in.  The  crowd  was  inconceiv- 
able." Our  youthful  company  are  only  con- 
soled at  the  opera  by  the  voice  of  the  "  Siren 
Leoni." 

Susanna  steadily  follows  up  the  records 
of  her  sight-seeing :  she  visits  Wedgwood's 
classic  potteries,  which  were  then  the  fashion, 
she  describes  the  models  brought  over  by 
Sir  William  Hamilton.  Her  friends  also  take 
her  to   the    Exhibition  of  the    Royal  Academy 


140  FKOM  THE   PORCH 

of  Paintings,  where  the  young  ladies,  we  are  told, 
"divert  the  gentlemen  by  delivering  opinions 
with  all  the  arrogance  of  connoisseurs." 

Some  of  us  may  know  Pamberg's  delightful 
print  of  an  exhibition  at  the  Poyal  Academy 
some  ten  years  later,  in  1787,  of  which  a  fine 
copy  was  in  the  studio  of  our  own  President 
of  1886.  As  one  looks  at  the  picture,  the  cen- 
tury rolls  off,  the  sleeping  palace  awakens,  the 
ladies  in  their  nodding  plumes,  the  courtly  gentle- 
men, with  their  well-dressed  legs  and  swords, 
exchange  greetings.  We  seem  at  home  in  the 
unpretending  rooms  with  the  familiar  pictures 
on  the  walls  (the  dear  little  strawberry-girl  is 
hanging  there  among  the  rest) ;  and  we  can  see 
the  originals  of  those  charming  figures  we  all 
know  so  well  depicted  gazing  up  at  their  own 
portraits.  Pules  and  regulations  must  have  been 
less  strictly  measured  out  then  than  they  are  now, 
for  although  umbrellas  did  not  play  that  important 
part  which  belongs  to  them  at  present,  sticks 
and  swords  without  number  seem  to  have  been 
boldly  introduced  into  the  gallery,  to  say  nothing 
of  a  little  dog  frisking  merrily  in  the  fore- 
ground. 


MRS.  JOHN  TAYLOR,  OF  NORWICH    141 

The  experience   of  each  generation  varies  in 
turn,  with   its  dress   and    peculiarities ;   ours    is 
(as  yet)  exempt  from    certain    trials  which   are 
feelingly  alluded  to  by  Miss  Cook  in  her  corre- 
spondence, and  of  which  Madame  d'Arblay,  Mrs. 
Barbauld,    and    others    also    bitterly   complain. 
The    elegant    ladies    of  Sir   Joshua's   powdering 
times  certainly  had  their  own  trials.     We  find 
the  young  traveller  warmly  congratulating  her 
friend  Judith  upon  a  marvellous  escape ;  where 
other   headdresses   succumbed,    Judith's   feather 
had  remained  steady  in  its  place.     Susanna  has 
seen  many  distresses  occasioned  by  these  fashion- 
able   embellishments ;    among   the    sufferers    she 
mentions  two  ladies  unfortunately  sitting  next 
each  other  at  a  concert,  "  whose  heads  met  and 
becoming   immediately  entangled,  the   attempts 
they  made  to  extricate  themselves  only  increased 
the  difficulty,  until,  finally,   one  of  the   fabrics 
was  demolished."     Another  tragic  story  is  that 
of  a  helle  dancing  in  a  cotillon  who  seems  sud- 
denly  to    have    "  lost    the    whole   of  a  majestic 
superstructure,    which    rolled    backwards    while 
the    company    fled    from    the    cataclysm " ;    one 
can  imagine,  says  Miss  Cook,  "  the  falling  curls 


142  FROM   THE  PORCH 

and  the  clouds  of  powder,  and  the  despair  of 
the  poor  victim  of  this  vertigo." 

Susanna  gives  another  page  or  two  to  the 
fashions:  she  describes  what  she  calls  "an 
anecdote  upon  Lady  Harriet  Foley  which  made 
quite  a  bustle."  This  lady  appeared  at  Court 
after  her  marriage  in  a  suit  of  white  lutestring 
trimmed  with  large  bunches  of  acorns,  of  which 
the  cups  had  really  grown  upon  oak-trees. 
The  idea  was  immediately  seized  upon,  the 
fashion  adopted,  and  the  dresses  for  a  mas- 
querade at  Carlyle  House  which  followed  were 
whimsical  and  ridiculous  to  the  highest  degree. 
It  must  have  been  on  this  occasion  that  one  has 
read  of  ladies  appearing  with  whole  branches 
of  oak,  roughly  sawn  off,  and  balanced  on  their 
powdered  heads. 

The  same  gift  which  stood  Mrs.  Taylor  in 
such  good  stead  in  later  life,  that  power  of 
throwing  herself  into  her  surroundings,  of  ap- 
preciating and  enjoying  the  gifts  of  others, 
marks  her  early  experiences.  She  has  a  decided 
taste  for  human  nature.  There  are  so  many 
different  sorts  of  people,  she  says.  Her  artless 
enthusiasm    for    the    lovely    Miss    Linley,    who 


MKS.  JOHN   TAYLOE,   OF  NORWICH    143 

had  been  singing  at  Norwich,  will  not  surprise 
any  of  those  who  have  lately  seen  the  enchant- 
ing portrait  of  the  wife,  mother,  and  grand- 
mother of  the  Sheridans, — the  saint,  as  Garrick 
called  her  a  hundred  years  ago,  and  whom  one 
might  well  be  inclined  to  canonise  now  that 
the  necessary  hundred  years  are  past, 

II 

Now  and  again  our  young  traveller  varies 
her  correspondence  with  certain  philosophical 
disquisitions  upon  the  frivolous  diversions  in 
which  she  sees  most  women  engaged ;  the  idle 
amusements  which  they  so  ardently  desire  furnish 
her  with  subjects  of  wonder  and  amazement. 
Life  was  meant  for  better  things,  she  says,  and 
not  least  to  render  ourselves  in  all  our  capacities 
as  serviceable  as  we  possibly  can.  And  this 
outward  grace  of  good-will  in  the  creed  of  the 
then  inhabitants  of  Norfolk  meant  something 
very  substantial,  and  was  represented  by  many 
visible  signs :  kind  offices,  turkeys,  Norfolk 
pippins,  strings  of  sausages,  long  visits  cordially 
welcomed  from  impecunious  relatives,  were  all 
a  part  of  it. 


144  FROM   THE   PORCH 

Perhaps,  as  these  early  letters  flow  on,  the 
sympathetical  Judith  may  have  begun  to  sur- 
mise some  events  in  prospect.  There  is  an 
indefinable  change  in  the  style,  there  are 
allusions  to  the  writer's  happy  lot,  to  a  delight- 
ful succession  of  guests  and  surprises.  Although 
Susanna  declares  that  a  certain  serenity  of 
mind  is  absolutely  necessary  to  improvement,  we 
hear  of  picnics,  excursions,  and  riding  parties. 
Her  enthusiastic  admiration  of  a  moonlight 
night  is  productive  of  diversion  to  her  friends, 
she  says,  who  laugh  at  her  raptures,  while  she 
rails  at  their  want  of  taste.  One  cannot  help 
seeing  the  picture,  as  she  unconsciously  sketches 
it  in,  the  animated  young  horsewoman,  the 
happy  young  company,  that  friend  in  particular 
who  is  laughing,  coming  along  the  moonlit 
lane.  Surely  it  is  an  absorbing  hour  of  life 
which  has  dawned  for  Miss  Susanna ;  and  before 
long,  moonlight  philosophy  serenity  of  mind — 
all  are  resolved  into  the  important  fact  that 
Mr.  John  Taylor,  the  "  excellent  young  man 
to  whom  she  is  so  soon  to  be  united,"  has 
appeared  upon  the  scene !  There  is  finally  a 
demure,  dignified,  yet  warm-hearted  letter  from 


MES.  JOHN  TAYLOR,  OF   NORWICH    145 

the  bride,  Mrs.  John  Taylor,  to  her  old  friend 
Judith,  who  is  also  married  by  this  time,  and 
Judith  no  longer,  but  "my  dear  Mrs.  Beecroft." 
Mrs.  Taylor  brings  the  light  of  her  own  warm 
and  happy  hearth  into  her  exhortations  to  her 
friend. 

"The  constant  desire,"  she  says,  "of  a  wife 
of  giving  pleasure  to  lier  husband,  makes  even 
trifling  affairs  of  some  importance ;  this  affords 
that  stimulus  which  is  so  needful  to  keep  the 
active  mind  from  weariness  and  lassitude.  I 
feel  too  much  on  your  account,  beloved  friend, 
to  salute  you  with  the  usual  forms  of  con- 
gratulation ;  may  as  much  happiness  be  yours 
as  this  life  affords." 

Mrs.  Taylor  herself  and  her  husband  only 
"wish  to  tread  in  the  peaceful  paths  of  life." 
Mr.  Taylor  was  established  in  business  at  Nor- 
wich, and  here  he  and  his  Susanna  settled  down 
in  the  year  1778  after  a  wedding  tour  to  the 
North.  They  settle  among  their  friends  and 
their  kinsfolk.  In  due  time  children  begin  to 
figure  in  the  closely-written  pages  despatched 
to  aunts  and  adjacent  relatives,  and  witli  little 
John  and  little  Richard    follow  the  usual  cate-* 


146  FROM   THE   PORCH 

gories  of  a  young  mother''s  happy  trials  and 
anxious  joys.  Mr.  Taylor's  business  also  flourishes. 
They  do  not  want  for  money,  for  their  wishes  are 
moderate  enough  to  be  fulfilled.  While  the 
children  fill  the  little  home  and  the  cares 
increase,  new  friends  gather  round. 

We  have  most  of  us  at  one  time  or  another 
known  the  old  Norse  settlement,  where  the 
Danish  fleets  once  landed,  before  the  sea  rolled 
back,  leaving  the  old  city  of  Norwich  high  and 
dry  upon  its  hill  side,  with  its  busy  interests, 
its  pleasant  homes,  its  lively  inhabitants,  whose 
companionship  seems  seasoned  with  a  certain 
flavour  of  independent  thought  and  a  taste 
of  Attic  salt  blown  in  from  the  neighbour- 
ing bays  and  shores  and  promontories ;  and, 
indeed,  the  life  of  a  community  within  an  hour's 
journey  from  the  sea  is  one  to  which  certain 
happy  moods  and  sudden  upliftings  must  neces- 
sarily belong.  Within  easy  reach  of  Norwich 
stands  Felbrigge,  once  the  home  of  the  Wind- 
hams,  the  "  hillside-ridge,"  among  the  woods  and 
avenues  of  oak,  with  its  glorious  sights  of  sky 
and  sea  beyond  ;  there  is  also  Cromer,  between 
billows  of  down  and  broad  reaches  of  silver  sand  ; 


MRS.  JOHN  TAYLOR,   OF   NORWICH    147 

still  nearer  at  hand  is  Earlhani  Hall,  the  birth- 
place of  the  Gurneys — that  stately  old  house 
among  lawns  and  spreading  trees,  where  Wilber- 
force  used  to  rest  upon  a  pleasant  bench  which 
is  still  pointed  out  ;  whither  Elizabeth  Fry 
returned  from  time  to  time,  and  where  we  some- 
times hear  of  Mrs.  Taylor  spending  a  summer's 
afternoon.  At  Holkham,  another  neighbouring 
place,  Mr.  Coke  (as  an  epigrammatic  historian 
tells  us)  was  then  making  poor  land  fertile,  and  in 
return  for  half  a  million  so  liberally  spent  was 
destined  to  be  set  upon  some  ten  years  later  by 
the  furious  Norwich  mob.  Mrs.  Taylor  speaks 
of  visiting  at  Holkham,  and  hopes  "  they 
may  enjoy  themselves  notwithstanding  the 
French." 

She  was  already  popular  and  much  made  of  in 
her  own  little  world,  and  also  visited  by  friends 
from  other  circles.  Mrs.  Procter  remembers  her 
own  step-father,  Basil  Montagu,  speaking  with 
regard  and  admiration  of  the  quiet  Norwich  lady. 
Another  name  often  occurs  in  her  letters,  that  of 
one  of  the  most  brilliant  and  popular  men  of  those 
brilliant  times,  Sir  James  Mackintosh,  for  whom 
Madame  de  Stael  and  Napoleon  (for  once  agree- 


148  FROM   THE   PORCH 

ing)  both  expressed  their  admiration.  Madame 
de  Stael  used  to  go  so  far  as  to  say  that  Sir 
James  was  among  EngHshmen  the  most  interest- 
ing man  she  had  ever  met.  On  one  occasion 
when  he  and  Madame  de  Stael  alone  outstayed  a 
brilliant  company  at  Bowood,  Lord  Lansdowne 
told  Mrs.  Kemble  that  in  all  his  life  he  had 
never  heard  anything  to  approach  the  varied 
charm  of  the  dialogue  of  these  two  distinguished 
people. 

Sir  James  Mackintosh's  feeling  for  Mrs.  Taylor 
must  have  been  of  a  different  order  from  that 
which  the  brilliant  Corinne  inspired.  How 
homely,  how  genuine,  are  his  kind  words  to  the 
quiet  Norwich  housewife !  "I  ought  to  be  made 
permanently  better  by  contemplating  such  a 
mind  as  yours,"  he  writes  ;  and  he  dwells  affec- 
tionately upon  her  goodness,  her  fidelity  in 
friendship,  that  "  industrious  benevolence  which 
requires  a  vigorous  understanding  and  a  decisive 
character."  "  The  assize  week  brought  us  Mr. 
Mackintosh  and  Basil  Montagu,"  Mrs.  Taylor 
says  in  a  letter  to  Dr.  Reeve.  "  Mackintosh 
spent  an  evening  with  us  alone.  He  was  brilliant, 
instructive,  sentimental — in  fact,  everything  that 


MRS.  JOHN  TAYLOK,  OF  NOKWICH    149 

the  various  powers  of  his  mind  would  enable  him 
to  be." 

In  the  little  Norwich  parlour,  as  in  the  Bowood 
drawing-room,  one  can  imagine  Mackintosh  pour- 
ing out  his  delightful  flood  of  talk,  while  Mrs. 
Taylor,  like  the  princess  in  the  fairy  tale,  sits 
listening,  without  time  to  intermit  her  labours. 
It  was  Lucy  Aiken  who  used  to  describe  how 
she  would  go  on  darning  her  sons'  grey  worsted 
stockings  while  she  was  holding  her  own  with 
Brougham,  or  Mackintosh,  or  Southey — flashing 
out  epigrams  at  a  room  full  of  wits, 

III 

The  Taylors  belonged  to  the  sturdy,  sensible, 
stoical  school  which  flourished  in  the  beginning 
of  the  century,  amid  the  alarms  and  catastrophes 
all  round  about  ;  the  great  wars,  the  momentous 
struggles  of  Napoleon's  ambition,  the  heavings 
of  the  French  Revolution.  This  quiet  English 
household  was  only  in  so  far  diflerent  from  a 
hundred  others,  that  its  mistress  was  a  woman 
possessing  more  strength  of  mind,  character,  and 
perception  than  falls  to  the  lot  of  many. 

A  friend  who  still  remembers  Mrs.  Taylor  has 


150  FKOM   THE  PORCH 

described  her  as  follows:  "I  used  to  see  Mrs. 
John  Taylor  at  Mrs.  Barbauld's,  when  I  was  a 
mere  child,  so  that  my  recollections  are  only  of 
her  appearance  and  manner.  She  could  never 
have  been  tall  and  handsome  as  her  two  daughters 
were ;  but  she  had  fine  dark  grey  eyes,  and 
marked  features.  Her  voice  was  deep-toned,  her 
way  of  speaking  decided  and  clear."  Mrs.  Taylor, 
we  are  told,  cared  little  for  appearances  ;  her 
dress  was  apt  to  be  unbecoming. 

Mr.  Reeve  has  sometimes  described  his  grand- 
mother in  later  days  :  actively  ruling  in  her  little 
kingdom,  full  of  care  and  hospitality  and  help  for 
others,  occupied  with  every  household  interest ; 
although  delicate  in  health,  yet  toiling  daily  up 
the  hill  to  the  great  Norwich  market,  to  cater 
for  her  family,  followed  by  a  maid  carrying  the 
brimming  baskets.  There  is  something  which 
reminds  one  of  Mrs.  Carlyle  in  the  raciness  and 
originality  of  Susanna  Taylor's  mind,  as  well  as 
in  the  keen  interest  she  gives  to  all  the  details 
of  her  home,  and  to  the  necessities  of  the  people 
she  comes  across.  She  is  happier  than  Jane 
Carlyle  in  the  good  and  happy  children  growing 
up  and  around  her,  upon  whom   she    can   pour 


MKS.  JOHN  TAYLOK,  OF  NORWICH   151 

out  all  the  warmth  and  energy  of  her  aftec- 
tions. 

Dr.  Keeve  seems  to  have  been  a  sort  of  adopted 
son  of  the  house  long  before  his  engagement  to 
Susan  the  younger  daughter,  and  to  have  lived 
and  grown  up  among  all  these  young  people,  and 
to  have  been  very  near  the  mother's  heart.  He 
is  sorely  missed  when  the  time  comes  for  his 
departure  from  among  them. 

"  I  rather  envy  Mr.  Frenshaw,"  writes  Mrs. 
Taylor,  "  when  I  see  him  mending  pens  and 
pouring  over  small  print :  my  eyes  are  somewhat 
more  bedimmed  than  usual,  for  they  overflow 
now  and  then  in  spite  of  myself  Cowper  says 
in  his  address  to  his  mother's  picture  : 

'  Whei'e  thou  art  gone, 
Adieus  and  Farewells  are  a  sound  unknown.' 

In  this  odd  world  they  seem  to  be  the  most 
common  of  all  words.  To  be  sure,  partings  and 
meetings  give  variety  to  our  existence  ;  but  I 
am  now  grown  so  dull  as  not  to  want  variety. 
If  I  should  wish  for  any,  I  must  be  contented 
to  have  it  all  second-hand.  And  so,  when  you 
have  seen  London  and  the  Lakes  and  Edinburgh, 


152  FROM  THE  PORCH 

all  of  which   I  know  and   have  seen  in  former 
days,  you  may  tell  me  what  you  think  of  them." 

"  Nothing  at  present  suits  my  taste  so  well " 
(she  says  in  another  letter),  "as  Susan's  Latin 
lessons  and  her  philosophical  old  master.  .  .  . 
When  we  get  to  Cicero's  discussions  on  the 
nature  of  the  soul,  or  Virgil's  line  descriptions, 
my  mind  is  filled  up.  Life  is  either  a  dull  round 
of  eating,  drinking,  and  sleeping,  or  a  spark  of 
ethereal  fire  just  kindled. 

"  Do  not  suppose  I  am  beginning  or  ever  will 
begin  to  preach  to  you.  We  know  each  other's 
opinions  upon  these  topics,  and  we  equally 
despise  any  shackles  for  the  human  mind  but 
those  which  God  and  Nature  impose  upon  us. 
But  if  we  endeavour  to  escape  from  these,  we 
certainly  subject  ourselves  to  others  infinitely 
more  galling." 

What  a  good  friend  she  must  have  been  for 
a  young  man  at  his  start  in  life — what  a  good 
companion !  Her  letters  are  full  of  charming 
sense,  of  useful  and  pleasant  suggestions,  and 
as  one  quotes  at  random  one  feels  that  they 
contain  a  hundred  things  which  ought  still  to 
be  said  to  the  young,  still  to  be  felt  by  the  old. 


MRS.  JOHN  TAYLOK,  OF  NORWICH    153 

On  one  occasion,  after  enumerating  several 
remarkable  people,  she  names  a  certain  Mr. 
Wishaw. 

"  I  would  not  have  said  so  much  about  a 
person  you  know  nothing  of,  but  for  the  com- 
fortable feeling  that  2^eo2')lG  of  the  right  sort  are 
ahvays  to  he  found,  and  also  that  they  are  some- 
times happily  thrown  in  our  way  ;  nothing  tends 
more  to  enjoyment  than  to  keep  up  a  taste  for 
their  company  whenever  and  wherever  it  can 
be  had,  instead  of  fancying  that  excellence  is 
the  exclusive  production  of  past  times  or  distant 
parts." 

Is  there  not  a  whole  philosophy  of  good  sense 
in  all  this?  Mrs.  Taylor  was  no  optimist  like 
her  friend  Mrs.  Opie  ;  she  had  no  exaggerated 
ideas  of  life  and  its  possibilities  ;  but  she  fully 
realised  what  was  possible,  and  she  held  faithfully 
and  gratefully  to  the  blessings  within  her  grasp. 
She  continues  very  warmly  attached  to  her 
young  correspondent.  *'  The  very  feelings  which 
have  produced  such  a  friendship  must  perpetuate 
it,"  she  says  ;  and  few  people  knew  better  than 
she  did  what  it  was  to  possess  warm  and  en- 
thusiastic friends. 


154  FROM   THE   PORCH 

So  she  writes  on,  discoursing,  philosophising, 
throwing  out  the  suggestions  of  her  bright  and 
practical  mind  as  they  occur  to  her,  and  we 
cannot  do  better  than  to  go  on  quoting  the 
passages  as  they  occur.  Here  is  one  of  her 
sensible  sententious  observations. 

"  There  is  no  surer  way  of  becoming  acquainted 
with  our  own  mind  than  by  the  effect  produced 
upon  it  by  the  conduct  of  others ;  if  we  can 
tolerate  vice  and  folly,  we  may  grow  fond  of 
them  in  time.  Perhaps,"  she  continues,  "you 
can  bear  witness  to  the  truth  of  another  remark, 
that  people  generally  wrap  themselves  up  in  a 
solemn  kind  of  reserve,  and  particularly  those 
who  have  taken  upon  themselves  the  task  of 
enlightening  the  world.  It  is  to  be  accounted 
for  from  the  jealousy  and  fear  of  losing  a 
reputation  once  acquired,  by  the  unguarded 
frankness  of  colloquial  intercourse.  Be  it  ours, 
my  dear  friend,  merrily  to  philosophise,  sweetly 
to  play  the  fool.  Strange  counsel  to  a  young 
man  in  a  grave  university." 

Through  all  the  tumult  of  the  early  years  of 
the  century  the  Taylors'  home  pursues  its  steady 
life.     The   elder   boys  grow  up  and  go  out  into 


MRS.  JOHN  TAYLOR,  OF  NORWICH    155 

the  world  ;  little  Sally,  the  pet  of  the  family, 
who  is  to  translate  Ranke  in  after  life,  is  be- 
ginning to  write  in  round-hand ;  Susan  is  still 
Mr.  Frenshaw's  pupil ;  of  herself  Mrs.  Taylor 
writes : 

"  For  my  part  I  never  valued  life  more  than 
I  do  at  present,  yet  I  think  it  would  be  a  relief 
to  me  to  feel  as  if  I  could  be  spared ;  but  perhaps 
in  this  I  deceive  myself,  and  one  of  the  charms 
of  the  world  may  be  that  I  am  still  wanted  in  it. 
It  is  a  pleasant  world  after  all,  and  for  your 
comfort,  my  dear  friend,  let  me  tell  you  that 
it  is  not  only  pleasant  at  that  delicious  season 
which  we  may  denominate  the  morning  of  our 
existence, — there  is  a  chastened,  a  temperate 
kind  of  happiness,  which  is  perhaps  to  the  full 
as  desirable  as  the  more  glowing  sensations  of 
our  early  days." 

She  is  greatly  interested  in  the  Ediiihuvgh 
Review^  then  in  its  earliest  numbers.  It  was 
first  published  in  1802;  Jeffrey,  Brougham,  and 
Sydney  Smith  were  its  founders,  clothing  the 
new-born  potentate  in  the  Whig  colours,  blue 
and  yellow.  Dr.  Reeve,  who  had  then  only 
just  taken  his  degree  at  Edinburgh,  contributed 


156  FROM   THE  PORCH 

some  articles  to  the  first  numbers.  Reviews 
have  their  own  life  and  growth.  This  one 
toned  down  with  time ;  but  in  its  early  days 
it  was  somewhat  over-vigorous  and  unsparing 
in  its  measure.  Mrs.  Taylor  has  been  reading 
an  article  on  the  Life  of  Cowper,  and  the  busy 
lady,  dispensing  her  loaves  and  fishes,  still  finds 
time  to  review  the  reviewer,  and  to  add  her  own 
excellent  comment  to  the  text.     She  says  : 

"  Mr.  Hayley's  style  wants  that  majestic 
simplicity  with  which  such  a  character  as 
Cowper's  should  have  been  portrayed.  He 
thinks  it  necessary  too,  as  Mr.  Jeffrey  observes, 
to  praise  everybody.  This  is  so  like  the  misses 
who  call  all  their  insipid  acquaintance  '  sweet,' 
and  '  interesting,'  that  it  makes  me  rather  sick. 
A  biographer  is  good  for  nothing  who  does  not 
give  those  touches,  those  lights  and  shadows 
which  identify  his  characters ; — on  this  account 
I  do  not  like  a  remark  of  the  reviewer  that  Mrs. 
Unwin's  little  jealousies  of  Lady  Austen  might 
as  well  have  been  passed  over  in  silence.  If  the 
weaknesses  of  excellent  people  are  to  be  con- 
cealed, how  shall  we  form  an  accurate  impression 
of  human  nature  ? " 


MRS.  JOHN  TAYLOR,  OF   NORWICH    157 

It  would  certainly  be  difficult  to  tell  one  person 
from  another.     Again  she  says  : 

"  Nothing  can  operate  more  powerfully  against 
the  attainment  of  excellences  in  every  species  of 
composition,  than  the  indiscriminate  praise,  and 
false  tenderness,  which  prevent  those  writers 
who  are  capable  of  higher  degrees  of  improve- 
ment from  endeavouring  sedulously  to  aim  at 
greater  perfection,  or  which  lead  those  who  are 
incapable  to  trouble  the  public  at  all.  I  have 
been  witness  to  such  extravagant  praises  bestowed 
upon  inferior  compositions,  especially  in  London, 
that  I  rejoice  in  the  more  hardy  criticism  of  our 
northern  metropolis,  not  from  a  desire  to  depre- 
ciate, but  from  a  conviction  that,  the  more 
completely  both  books  and  characters  find  their 
proper  stations,  the  better  it  will  be  for  society. 
I  think  the  '  E.  R.'  contains  just  but  not  ill- 
natured  criticism. 

"  If  I  were  inclined  to  make  an  appeal  for  any 
person  who  has  fallen  under  the  lash,  it  would  be 
for  Robert  Southey,  whose  experiments  in  poetry 
I  acknowledge  to  be  many  of  them  fantastic  and 
extravagant,  but  they  are  the  experiments  of  a 
man    of  genius.   ...   I    think   we    ought    to    be 


158  FROM   THE   PORCH 

thankful  to  literary  pioneers.  .  .  .  After  all  that 
can  be  said  as  an  apology  for  the  new  school  of 
poets,  they  (themselves)  must  find  the  exact 
boundary  between  simplicity  and  childish 
puerility." 

IV 

One  important  element  of  daily  life  in  England 
all  this  time  must  not  be  overlooked,  and  that 
was,  ^the  prevailing  fear  of  a  French  invasion 
which  constantly  haunted  people's  minds.  Sir 
George  Napier,  in  his  Memoirs,  tells  us  that  he 
heard  from  Soult  himself  that  the  project  was 
in  the  Emperor's  thoughts. 

In  Herbert  Fisher's  History  of  Na'poleon  we 
read  of  the  Emperor  "  spending  five  weeks  on 
the  north  coast  of  France  in  the  summer  of  1804, 
throwing  the  whole  weight  of  his  fiery  energy 
into  the  naval  preparations,  and  taking  a  strange 
exhilaration  and  excitement  from  the  movement 
of  the  sea ;  of  twenty  millions  of  francs  appro- 
priated to  the  improvement  of  the  roads  in 
Picardy  ;  and  of  a  medal  ordered  to  be  struck 
representing  Hercules  strangling  a  mermaid,  and 
bearing  the  legend,  '  Descente  en  Angleterre, 
frapp^  a  Londres,  1804.'" 


MRS.  JOHN  TAYLOR,  OF  NORWICH    159 

The  mermaid  was  not  unprepared. 

Mrs.  Taylor  describes  the  start  of  the  Norwich 
volunteers : 

"  I  begin  to  think  people  may  make  a  joke 
of  anything  if  they  try  ;  but  I  was  never  less 
disposed  to  be  merry  than  this  morning,  when, 
in  the  midst  of  pouring  rain,  our  volunteers  with 
three  cheers  bade  farewell  to  their  native  city ; 
Mr.  Houghton,  the  clergyman,  gave  a  breakfast 
on  the  occasion  by  candle-light.  Dear  little 
Mary  looked  on  with  wondering  eyes  at  her 
old  friends  transformed  into  soldiers.  If  the 
French  land  in  Norfolk,  I  shall  expect  prodigies 
of  valour  from  you.  What  do  you  think  of 
Richard  in  his  scarlet  uniform?  Of  all  things 
this  is  the  last  sight  I  should  have  dreamed  of 
seeing." 

The  French  never  landed  in  Norfolk,  but  an 
event  which  Mrs.  Taylor  contemplates  with  far 
less  equanimity  is  beginning  to  foreshadow  its 
coming.  Mr.  Frenshaw's  pupil  is  still  following 
her  Greek  lessons  and  sewing  her  seams,  but 
she  is  also  growing  up  day  by  day  and  hour  by 
hour  as  maidens  of  fifteen  are  apt  to  do,  and  her 
mother  (as  is  the  way  of  mothers)  is  among  the 


160  FROM   THE   PORCH 

last  to  realise  this  fact.  Little  Susan  who  leaves 
her  dressing  things  behind  her,  who  has  to  be 
reminded  to  tie  up  parcels  securely,  who  but 
yesterday  was  a  baby, — is  it  possible  that  already 
a  woman's  life  and  cares  are  awaiting  her,  and 
that  the  young  doctor  is  thinking  of  her  as  a 
helpmate  and  companion  for  life !  The  extra- 
ordinary fact  seems  to  have  taken  Mrs.  Taylor 
quite  by  surprise.  Mothers  and  daughters  of 
our  own  time  are  in  a  different  attitude  from  the 
affectionate  but  Minerva-like  terms  on  which 
they  were  content  to  remain  in  the  days  of 
which  we  are  writing.  I  have  heard  it  lately 
said  with  truth,  that  the  difference  of  feeling 
now  existing  between  parents  and  children,  far 
exceeds  the  natural  divergence  of  a  single 
generation.  A  whole  revolution  of  opinion  and 
impulse  has  come  about  within  the  last  twenty 
years,  dividing  even  young  mothers  from  their 
growing  daughters.  It  must  require  some 
generosity  and  intellect  in  a  parent  to  dis- 
criminate between  what  is  harmless  in  itself, 
though  it  may  absolutely  jar  against  her  own 
instincts  and  prejudices,  and  that  which  borders 
upon   the  common   and   the  reckless,  to  use  no 


MKS.  JOHN   TAYLOR,  OF   NORWICH   IGl 

harsher  words.  Mothers  and  daughters  in  those 
days  were  upon  terms  which  we  can  scarcely 
reaUse  now.  There  was  a  decorum,  a  dehbera- 
tion,  a  stiffness  in  their  intercourse  which  could 
perhaps  better  be  carried  out  before  posts, 
telegrams,  and  daily  papers  had  multiplied  occu- 
pation, familiarity,  and  consequent  haste.  It 
was  Mrs.  Taylor's  belief,  for  instance,  that  during 
her  girls'  absence  from  home  "  their  moral  im- 
provement would  keep  pace  with  their  intellectual, 
thanks  to  the  observations  and  discussions  they 
would  receive  by  letter."  All  these  grand  words 
mean  nothing  more,  after  all,  than  that  the 
mother  is  ever  thinking,  hoping,  planning  for 
her  children's  well-doing  and  safety. 

Susan  is,  however,  to  know  nothing  of  Dr. 
Reeve's  ardent  feelings ;  not  one  word  is  to 
reveal  to  her  the  romance  of  which  the  web  is 
silently  weaving  about  her.  She  is  only  sixteen  ; 
she  is  to  go  on  with  her  lessons,  to  see  some- 
thing of  the  world,  to  "  practise  housekeeping 
and  the  culinary  arts,  that  she  may  not  from 
mere  inexperience  make  mistakes  which  her 
husband   would    not   like " ;   but    no   glimpse   of 

his  real  feeling  is  to  be  allowed  to  her.     One 

L 


162  FKOM   THE   POECH 

feels  sorry  for  the  poor  lover,  and  yet  how  wise  is 
the  mother's  appeal  to  him  not  yet  to  disturb  her 
young  daughter's  serene  and  innocent  mind  ! 

"  Prove,"  she  says,  "  that  you  can,  as  you 
said  to  me,  command  your  feelings.  The  way 
to  allow  mind  and  body  to  come  to  perfection 
is  to  suffer  them  to  ripen  by  degrees. 

"  If  you  knew  what  harm  it  would  do  to  sub- 
stitute constrained  manners  for  innocent  frank- 
ness, and  to  carry  forward  Susan's  attention  to 
distant  objects,  instead  of  bestowing  the  whole 
force  of  her  mind  upon  present  subjects." 

And  then  comes  a  little  relenting  sympathy. 

"  When  either  you  or  I  am  inclined  to  torment 
ourselves  with  fruitless  wishes,  let  us  have  the 
comfort  of  thinking  there  is  always  one  person 
we  can  sit  down  and  open  our  hearts  to." 

The  anxious  mother  writes  page  after  page 
to  her  would-be  son-in-law,  half-scolding,  half- 
soothing.  Why  does  he  want  to  settle  in 
London  ?  Why  is  he  not  satisfied  with  Norwich 
and  Norwich  life  ? 

"  Dr.  Alderson,"  she  says,  "  after  reading  me 
those  letters  of  Mrs.  Opie's  which  completely 
prove    that    the    whole    fraternity    of    authors, 


MRS.  JOHN   TAYLOR,  OF   NORWICH   163 

artists,  lecturers,  and  publick  people  get  such  an 
insatiable  appetite  for  praise,  that  nothing  but 
the  greatest  adulation  can  prevent  their  being 
miserable,  came  to  this  sentence :  '  Dr.  Reeve, 
like  a  sensible  man,  prefers  London  to  Norwich.' 
'  Is  that  a  proof  of  sense,'  said  I,  '  to  reject  what 
you  allow  is  an  extraordinary  chance  of  settling 
to  advantage  in  a  place,  because  it  contains  but 
40,000  inhabitants  ! '  " 

Meanwhile,  in  1805,  Mrs.  Taylor  gives  an 
account  of  another  talk  with  Dr.  Alderson : 
"  '  What  a  pity  it  is  that  Dr.  Reeve  should  not 
settle  here,'  says  Dr.  Alderson,  '  when  there  is 
so  fine  an  opening  and  nobody  to  fill  up  the 
vacancy  at  the  hospital ;  but  London,  I  sup- 
pose.' .  .  .  '  Yes,'  said  I,  '  he  has  contracted 
something  of  the  disease  which  people  acquire 
by  living  there — a  sort  of  feeling  that  no  other 
place  is  fit  to  live  in.'"  To  which  the  kind  old 
doctor  replies  by  reminding  Mrs.  Taylor  that 
he,  himself,  will  be  dead  before  very  long,  and 
that  this  is  an  additional  reason  for  Dr.  Reevo  s 
return  to  Norwich.  And  very  soon,  and  with 
very  good  reason.  Dr.  Reeve  seems  to  have  made 
up  his  mind,  and  to  have  given  up  all  thouglit 


1G4  FROM   THE   PORCH 

of  settling  away  from  Norwich,  and,  premature 
though  it  may  have  appeared  to  the  poor  anxious 
mother,  he  seems  to  have  disclosed  his  feelings 
to  his  future  wife. 

Then  Susan  goes  to  London  to  visit  Mrs. 
Barbauld,  and  improve  her  mind,  and  the  en- 
gagement is  formally  announced.  Her  mother 
is  glad  she  reads  poetry  with  Mrs.  Barbauld, 
and  delighted  she  has  been  to  the  play.  Here 
comes  a  gentle  motherly  rebuke  : 

"  It  would  have  been  better  if  Reeve  had  not 
accompanied  you  to  Stoke  Newington ;  we  must 
not  only  mind  our  P's  and  Q's,  but  our  '  R's.'  You 
know  how  freely  I  like  to  talk  to  you  about 
everything.  Do  not  show  a  kind  of  weakness, 
which  in  the  end  never  fails  to  lower  a  woman, 
even  in  the  estimation  of  a  lover !  Men  may  be 
gratified  first  by  possessing  unbounded  influence 
over  the  mind  of  a  woman,  but  they  generally 
despise  her  for  it  in  the  end.  One  of  the  great 
evils  in  contracting  engagements  of  this  sort  at 
such  an  early  age  as  yours  is  the  full  disclosure 
of  afiections  owing  to  the  innocent  simplicity  of 
youth,  which  a  woman  at  a  more  advanced 
period,   from   a    due   sense   of  propriety,    would 


MBS.  JOHN   TAYLOR,  OF  NOKWICH   165 

certainly  in  some  measure  have  concealed.  For 
the  future  show  Keeve  that  you,  Hke  him,  can 
bear  absence  when  absence  is  necessary,  and 
that  the  only  way  to  be  fit  for  the  duties  of 
life  hereafter  is  to  perform  them  with  the  utmost 
zeal  and  alacrity  now." 

How  admirable  is  all  this,  how  Spartan,  how 
sensible — and  how  difficult  to  carry  out !  And 
then  comes  a  touching  little  bit  of  sentiment  on 
Mrs,  Taylor's  own  account : 

"  Your  father  has  just  reminded  me  that 
to-morrow  is  my  birthday.  What  a  difference 
between  the  beginning  of  life  and  the  close ; 
solicitude  on  one's  own  account  seems  quite 
extinguished  as  far  as  relates  to  this  world, 
not  so  for  one's  children.  Towards  them  it  will 
remain  to  the  last  moment ;  but  I  will  endeavour 
to  make  it  useful  without  being  troublesome  to 
you." 

Other  admonitions  follow,  warnings  against 
want  of  attention  to  respectful  demeanour  such 
as  is  never  to  be  observed  in  well-bred  girls ; 
and  then,  very  motherlike,  at  the  end  of  the 
letter  : 

"  Now   1   have  written   this  letter,   1   have  a 


166  FEOM  THE   PORCH 

great  mind  to  burn  it,  I  am  so  unwilling  to  give 
you  a  moment's  pain,  but  if  you  take  it  as  a 
proof  of  love,  and  determine  to  profit  by  it,  it 
will  rather  give  you  pleasure. 

"  When  you  are  absent  it  is  a  great  effort  to 
think  of  faults.  I  could  rather  sit  down  and  cry 
for  your  company." 

One  letter  winds  up  with  a  quotation  from 
one  of  the  lover's  epistles.  He  complains  that 
he  has  heard  nothing  for  several  weeks.  And 
here  it  is  not  possible  to  sympathise  as  much  as 
usual  when  the  mother  points  out  to  the  daughter 
that  she  should  not  encourage  her  lover  to  expect 
to  hear  more  often  than  is  convenient. 

Mrs.  Taylor,  as  other  mothers  have  been  and 
will  be  again,  is  still  perturbed  by  her  son-in-law's 
impatience,  by  his  ineradicable  conviction  that 
two  people  can  live  at  the  same  expense  as  one. 
Little  by  little,  however,  difficulties  are  removed. 
Mr.  Reeve's  father  promises  him  a  good  allow- 
ance ;  all  is  made  smooth  for  the  young  couple's 
future,  and  at  last  they  are  married  in  the 
autumn  of  1807.  A  house  belonging  to  the 
Kerrison  family  had  been  taken  in  Surrey  Street. 
We  hear  of  many  details :  linen  and  boilers,  and 


MRS.  JOHN   TAYLOR,  OF  NORWICH    167 

pails,  and  brushes,  and  scouring-cloths ;  a  faith- 
ful Mary  is  engaged,  who  falls  ill  from  over- 
scrubbing  and  has  to  be  nursed.  The  good 
mother  is  there  ready  to  see  to  everything,  to 
nurse,  to  shop,  to  order,  She  writes  full  and 
detailed  accounts  of  everything  that  is  in  pre- 
paration for  the  home.  "  Don't  you  wonder  we 
can  be  interested  in  anything,"  she  says,  "  while 
these  rivers  of  blood  are  flowing  on  the  Continent, 
only  to  complete  the  triumph  of  a  tyrant,  and 
to  rivet  the  chains  of  poor,  subjugated,  unhappy 
Europe  ?  But  nevertheless,  whatever  is  going 
on  round  about,  people  happily  go  on  being 
interested  in  their  own  lives,  and  in  those 
belonging  to  them," 

Perhaps  the  most  charming  letter  in  the  whole 
collection  is  one  from  Mrs.  Taylor  to  her  hus- 
band, towards  the  end  of  their  peaceful  married 
life,  in  which,  in  that  still  steady  and  exquisitely 
finished  handwriting,  she  treats  of  "  the  only 
subject  of  deep  interest  to  either  of  them,"  and 
recapitulates  the  family  history.  There  is  some- 
thing almost  biblical  in  the  calm  outlook,  in  the 
benediction  at  the  end  of  this  long  and  loving 
life.      "  As   the    father    and    mother    of    seven 


168  FEOM   THE   PORCH 

children,  we  have  reason  to  be  thankful  that 
they  are  what  they  are,  and  to  hope  that  their 
descendants  may  do  them  as  much  credit,  and 
give  them  as  much  comfort  .  .  .  that  John  and 
his  wife  are  living  in  a  handsome,  commodious 
house  in  a  polite  and  pleasant  neighbourhood  is 
a  gratifying  circumstance  as  far  as  health  is 
concerned."  Mrs.  Taylor  is  only  afraid  that 
their  children  may  not  sufficiently  remember  that 
this  style  of  living  is  entirely  dependent  upon 
the  father's  life  and  exertions.  She  next  comes 
to  her  beloved  Richard,  "  with  all  his  valuable 
acquirements,  his  genuine  humility,  disinterested 
kindness,  undeviating  integrity."  How  wise  is 
the  manner  of  her  wish  to  help  him !  "I  know 
no  other  way  to  make  ourselves  tolerably  easy 
about  this  dear  clever  child  of  ours,  than  to  let 
him  be  the  arbiter  of  his  own  destiny."  She 
feels,  she  writes,  "  that  each  one  of  them  should 
attain  to  that  measure  of  independence  which 
it  is  in  the  parents'  power  to  bestow,  at  what- 
ever cost  to  themselves."  Then  of  another  of 
her  sons,  "  It  would  embitter  my  latter  days  if 
I  thought  that  there  was  anything  standing 
against  Edward   which   would    distress    him,   or 


MKS.  JOHN   TAYLOR,  OF  NORWICH    169 

that  he  should  owe  to  the  favour  of  his  brethren 
what  he  is  really  entitled  to  from  you  ;  ...  it 
is  sometimes  as  much  a  parent's  duty  to  deviate 
from  the  equal  distribution  of  property  as  it  is 
in  general  to  adhere  to  it.  What  I  have  to 
give  goes  to  Sally  and  Deborah,  because  they 
want  it  more  than  my  other  daughters."  The 
whole  letter  breathes  a  spirit  of  wisdom  and 
good  sense  and  tender  justice,  and  is,  indeed, 
a  model  of  impartiality  and  unselfish  good  judg- 
ment. The  mother  is  ill  and  alone  at  Norwich  ; 
but  she  forbids  the  father  to  mention  this  to 
the  son  with  whom  he  is  staying.  "  You  know 
how  well  I  can  bear  being  alone  if  I  have  but 
books,  which  I  am  sure  never  to  want."  It  is 
in  this  same  letter  that  Mrs.  Taylor  speaks  of 
occasional  talks  with  her  "  eccentric  lodger " 
John  Stuart  Mill. 

As  time  goes  on  Susanna  Taylor  softens  and 
responds  more  and  more  to  youth.  For  her 
child's  child  her  warm  heart  seems  to  thaw  the 
formalities  of  her  time  and  age.  It  is  touching 
to  hear  of  the  faithful  remembrances  of  long-ago 
games  at  coach -and-horses,  in  which  grand- 
mamma is   the  horse,  and  "darling,"  as  she  calls 


170  FROM   THE   PORCH 

her  little  grandson,  is  the  coachman.  "  But  I  shall 
have  no  room  for  love  to  Darling  Boy,"  she  writes 
somewhere;  "he  must  have  almost  lost  the  idea 
of  Norwich-grandmamma."  The  grandchild  occu- 
pies her  mind,  and  delights  her  heart ;  how  proud 
she  is  of  his  cleverness  and  bright  intellect ;  she 
tries  to  excuse  her  weakness  on  utilitarian  prin- 
ciples, and  frames  a  scheme  in  which  the  grand- 
parents are  to  spoil  in  exact  proportion  to  the 
parents'  inflexibility. 

Sally,  the  younger  daughter,  is  also  the 
mother  of  a  little  daughter,  much  beloved  by 
"  mamma,"  as  she  calls  Mrs.  Taylor.  The  pre- 
sent writer  has  still  before  her  as  she  writes  the 
image  of  Lucie,  Lady  Duff  Gordon,  that  noble 
Spanish -looking  lady  of  whom  as  Sally's  baby 
there  are  such  pretty  details.  "  I  understand 
all  her  language ; — the  rubbish  drawer  is  her 
delight,"  says  Mrs.  Taylor,  and  then  she  adds, 
"It  is  time  she  left  me,  for  I  am  growing  to  be 
too  fond  of  Sally's  child."  Sally's  child's  child 
now  speaks  to  us,  a  fourth  generation  not  to  be 
overlooked. 

My  story  is  slender  enough.  The  figures  come 
and  go.     That  of  the  young  doctor  disappears 


MRS.  JOHN   TAYLOR,  OF  NORWICH   171 

far  too  early  from  the  peaceful  scene — for  peace- 
ful it  was  amid  the  storms  and  catastrophes  of 
the  time,  when  the  selfish  ambitions  of  the 
ambitious  could  only  be  atoned  for  by  the 
steady  moderation  and  unselfish  wisdom  of  the 
honourable  unknown. 


L'ART    D'ETRE   GRANDPfiRE^ 

I 

The  great  Hugo,  Victor  In  Poesy,  Victor  in 
Romance,  was  able  to  win  new  laurels  when  he 
in  his  old  age  wrote  of  "  L'Art  d'etre  Grand- 
pere."  It  is  a  knowledge  which  comes  naturally 
to  some,  a  chord  struck  between  the  happy  past 
and  the  golden  dawn  of  the  days  to  come. 

I  have  known  others  who  have  also  lived  in 
this  beautiful  region — an  epiphany  which  some 
of  the  wisest  have  joined,  when  they  come  from 
afar  with  their  dear  and  priceless  gifts  to  bless 
the  future,  as  yet  unrevealed. 

Just  about  a  hundred  years  ago  a  kind  old 
grandfather,  away  from  the  storms  and  terrors 
that  rent  Europe  in  those  troubled  days,  sat 
quietly  in  Nassau  Street,-  off  Portland  Place, 
writing  to  his  little  grandson.     The  writer  was 

'  Copyright,  1913,  by  Lady  Ritchie,  in  the  United  States  of 
America. 

2  Now  Suffolk  Street. 

172 


L'AET   D'KTEE   GIIANDP1>.TIE        173 

Major  James  Rennell  of  the   Hon.E.LC.S.,  one 
of  the  gentlest  and  most  unaffected  of  men,  the 
first  great  EngHsh  geographer,  as  Sir  Clements 
Markham    has    called    him,    a    man    who    had 
measured  space  and  oceans  and  traced  unknown 
currents,  who  had  mapped  out  India  and  Africa, 
whose  work  is  still  a  standard  of  reference,  and 
whose  name  was  then  known  and  held,  as  now, 
in  highest  esteem  by  all  the  savants  of  Europe. 
These   letters   of    his    were    addressed   in   deli- 
cate   handwriting    to    "  Master    James    Rennell 
Rodd."     They  begin   in   1812,  and  it  is  by  the 
permission    of    my   old    friend    and    connection, 
Mrs.  James  Bennell  Rodd,  that  I  have  been  able 
to  read  the  correspondence.     The  early  notes  are 
written  in  red  ink,  with  plainly  printed  charac- 
ters, to  make  them  easy  for  the  little  boy.     In 
sendino;  them  to  me  Mrs.  Rodd  wrote  as  follows  : 
"  My  husband  treasured  every  letter  his  grand- 
father  sent   him ;    the    first    began    on    his  first 
birthday,  and  until  the  boy  could  read,  the  little 
notes  came  following  each  other.     Major  Rennell 
lived  a  most  simple,  abstemious  life  in  what  was 
once  called  Nassau  Street,  with  his  old  servant 
Mary   Medley.     My  husband  as  a   boy  used  to 


174  FROM   THE  PORCH 

go  and  share  his  grandfather's  afternoon  coffee 
and  toast." 

Major  Rennell's  first  letter  to  his  grandson  ran 
as  follows  (it  is  dated  March  12,  1812) : 

"  My  dear  little  Double  Namesake, — 
Perhaps  I  may  be  the  first  person  who  has  ever 
approached  you  with  a  written  address.  I  shall 
use  no  flattery,  for  it  is  the  truth  to  say  that 
you  are  one  of  the  most  blameless  characters 
amongst  us.  ...  I  hear  much  of  your  filial 
affection  and  that  you  give  great  comfort  to 
your  worthy  parents.  ...  I  beg  my  kindest 
regards  to  your  good  father  and  mother. — Your 
most  affectionate,  G.-P." 

After  this  introduction  the  letters  run  on,  full 
of  interest  in  the  little  fellow's  childhood,  in  his 
toys  and  games,  in  his  life  at  school,  his  outings 
and  amusements ;  the  grandfather  telling  him 
also  of  his  own  doings,  his  walks,  the  quiet  daily 
round.  All  his  life  long  Major  Rennell  had 
lived  in  a  world  of  observation  as  well  as  of 
action,  and  he  still  notes  facts  and  experiences 
likely  to  interest  the  boy  and  to  be  understood 
by    him.       He    writes    of   the    weather,    of   the 


L'ART   D'ETRE   GRANDPERE       175 

harvests,  of  the  effects  of  the  storms  upon  the 
country  ;  he  writes  of  travellers  in  distant  places, 
of  the  perils  they  run.  He  himself  had  been 
a  mighty  traveller,  always  at  work,  always  in 
danger,  but  he  rarely  mentions  the  things  he 
has  accomplished  or  the  things  he  still  has  in 
contemplation  :  it  was  not,  indeed,  till  after  his 
death  that  some  of  these  latter  bore  fruit,  that 
recommendations  he  had  made  were  carried  out, 
and  his  daughter  enabled  to  edit  and  complete 
some  of  his  unfinished  labours. 

When  I  myself  was  a  girl  my  father  told  me 
that  in  his  early  married  days  no  one  was  more 
hospitable  to  him  and  to  my  mother  than  a 
certain  old  lady — a  cousin  of  his  father's — living 
in  Wimpole  Street,  where  I  can  also  remember 
her.  This  lady.  Major  Rennell's  daughter,  the 
beautiful  Jane  of  whom  her  father  was  so  proud, 
was  the  mother  of  little  James.  When  my 
sister  and  I  were  children  in  Kensington,  Lady 
Rodd's  big  carriage  used  to  come  driving  up 
Young  Street.  We  used  to  be  taken  for  drives 
in  it.  I  remember  the  grey  lining,  and  the 
loops  swaying  and  the  tassels,  and  how  this 
huge  chariot  used  to  swing  and  creak  as  it  went 


176  FROM  THE   PORCH 

along,  while  the  kind  old  occupant  talked  of  her 
own  youth  and  her  Admiral  and  of  her  son  and 
of  her  grandchildren.  On  other  occasions  the 
ancient  lady,  with  the  dark  eyes  and  the  black 
old-fashioned  hair,  used  to  send  for  us  to  the 
carriage  door,  and  she  would  then  produce  gifts, 
of  rare  make  and  dazzling  hue,  both  Eastern  and 
English  too,  and  hand  them  out  liberally.  She 
was  very  fond  of  my  father,  and  to  the  last  he 
used  to  take  us  to  call  upon  her. 

It  was,  as  I  have  said,  between  the  years 
1812-1827  that  Major  James  Rennell  was  writing 
to  his  little  grandson,  and  the  boy's  own  grand- 
children may  now  in  turn  look  for  themselves 
at  the  gentle,  merry  messages  sent  from  Nassau 
Street,  to  the  child  in  Cornwall,  to  the  school- 
boy at  Temple  Grove,  to  the  more  dignified 
Etonian ;  messages  from  the  eighteenth  to  the 
nineteenth  century  and  after! 

"  I  am  glad  that  you  liked  my  letter,  so 
I  send  you  another,"  writes  grandpapa,  who 
seems  to  be  for  the  moment  staying  in  James's 
home.  "Alicia  says  'my  love  and  a  kiss.'" 
(Nursery  talk  has  not  changed  much  in  the 
century  which  has  passed  since  this  correspond- 


L'ART   D'ETRE   GRANDPKRE       177 

ence  began.)  Then  the  epistle  contmues :  "I 
hear  that  you  ride  on  a  man's  saddle  and  that 
you  play  in  the  garden  at  Uncle  Tremayne's." 

As  we  read  on,  grandpapa  seems  to  have 
returned  to  his  own  house.  "  I  send  you  another 
red  letter,"  he  says ;  "I  am  much  obliged  to 
you  for  all  your  kindness  to  me  whilst  I  was 
with  you.  I  walked  with  your  favourite  Juno, 
in  Portland  Place  this  morning,  and  we  talked 
about  you." 

James  the  Less  at  East  Sheen  received  visits 
as  well  as  letters. 

"I  do  not  know  when  I  have  enjoyed  so 
heartfelt  a  sight  [writes  the  grandfather  to  his 
grandson  at  Dr.  Pinkney's,  Temple  Grove,  East 
Sheen]  as  on  the  other  day  when  we  walked 
round  the  lawn  and  saw  so  many  fine  and 
promising  young  gentlemen  engaged  in  innocent 
play.  I  have  thought  of  it  and  mentioned  it 
several  times  since,  and  consequently  I  have 
derived  much  comfort  and  have  anticipated 
great  advantages  to  yourself  from  all  that  1 
saw.   ..." 

Collingwood's  letters  to  his  home  are  not  more 
charming    than    the    happy    flow    from    the    old 


M 


178  FROM  THE   PORCH 

warrior ;  remembering  things  for  little  James  to 
remember. 

"  I  hope  the  evening  turned  out  fine  on 
Wednesday  [he  writes  on  August  13,  1825], 
and  that  the  Poney  carried  you  pleasantly.  The 
Duke'  s  Park  (Woburn)  seems  made  for  you  and 
your  Poney,  and  I  should  myself  enjoy  a  ride 
of  that  kind.  The  Mansion  House  or  Abbey 
seemed  to  me  to  be  the  least  interesting  part 
of  the  whole,  but  the  Park,  altogether,  and 
particularly  the  Green  Lane,  delighted  me. 

"  Saturday,  yesterday,  was  a  remarkably  fine 
day,  and  I  had  some  good  walks.  Your  sisters 
were  here  and  drank  coffee  with  me.  They 
sent  several  kisses  which  you  may  distribute. 
To-day,  at  half-past  eight  it  began  to  rain,  and 
I  fear  it  will  be  a  rainy  day,  but  I  shall  watch 
the  weather.  The  streets  are  black  with  people 
in  mourning.  I  think  I  never  saw  shopping 
business  so  dull,  or  so  few  gentlefolk's  carriages 
in  the  streets.  I  have  read  a  good  deal  in 
your  book,  but  there  are  many  mistakes  which 
you  should  be  apprised  of  not  to  be  misled — 
Captain  Brenton  allows  three  millions  and  a 
half  of  negro  slaves  in  the  Southern  States  of 


L'ART   D'ETRE   GRANDPERE       179 

America — I  mean  the  United  States,  where  by 
the  last  census  there  were  a  million  and  a  half 
and  no  more,  he  certainly  does  not  read.  I 
have  heard  nothing  more  of  Colonel  Thackeray. 
Pray  give  my  kind  love  to  papa  and  mamma, 
and  kind  regards  to  Lady  Inglis  and  the  young 
ladies. — Your  affectionate, 

"G.-P.  J.  Rennell." 

"  My  dear  James, — 

"  You  were  in  all  your  glory  when  in  the  pew 
with  Mrs.  Pinkney.  I  can  remember  things 
similar  to  it  when  I  was  a  boy.  I  gave  your 
kind  messages  to  your  sisters,  and  they  send 
you  their  loves  in  return.  I  suppose  that  you 
know  that  'our  globe  (earth)  is  flatted  a  little 
at  the  poles,  and  rises  higher  at  the  equator,  and 
although  the  difference  be  only  about  35  miles, 
yet  it  occasions  vast  changes  in  course  of  time, 
and  in  the  going  of  a  clock  which  may  keep 
exact  time  here.  If  my  clock  was  carried  to 
any  place  near  the  equator,  it  would  lose  two 
minutes  and  a  half  per  day.  Jupiter  is  much 
flatter  than  our  earth ;  one  may  perceive  it 
in  a  large  telescope. 


180  FROM   THE   PORCH 

"  Did  you  hear  that  Dr.  Oudeney  and  another 
gentleman  with  him  exploring  the  interior  of 
Africa  are  dead  ?  These  make  twelve  gentle- 
men who  have  been  sent  to  explore  Africa, 
and  not  one  of  them  finally  returned.  Park 
came  back  the  first  time^  and  perished  in  the 
second.  There  are  still  two  gentlemen  alive  of 
Dr.  Oudeney 's  party  who  are  pursuing  their 
inquiries.  My  respects  to  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Pinkney, 
and  I  hope  you  will  favour  me  with  another 
letter. — Your  affectionate, 

"G.-P.  J.  Rennell." 

^  It  was  Major  Rennell  who,  having  first  constructed  the  map 
of  the  northern  part  of  Africa  in  1790,  afterwards  worked  upon 
the  notes  and  memoranda  brought  back  by  Mungo  Park.  Readers 
of  Lockhart  will  remember  Park's  meetings  with  Walter  Scott. 
"  Calling  one  day  at  Fowlsheils  and  not  finding  Park  at  home, 
Scott  walked  in  search  of  him  along  the  banks  of  the  Yarrow, 
which  in  that  neighbourhood  passes  over  various  ledges  of  rock 
forming  deep  pools  and  eddies  between  them.  Presently  he  dis- 
covered his  friend  standing  alone  on  the  bank  plunging  one  stone 
after  another  into  the  water  and  watching  anxiously  the  bubbles 
as  they  rose  to  the  surface.  '  This,'  said  Scott,  '  appears  but  an 
idle  amusement  for  one  who  has  seen  so  much  stirring  adventure.' 
*  Not  so  idle  perhaps  as  you  suppose,'  answered  Mungo.  '  This  was 
the  manner  in  which  I  used  to  ascertain  the  depth  of  a  river  in 
Africa  before  I  ventured  to  cross  it — judging  whether  the  attempt 
would  be  safe  by  the  time  the  bubbles  of  air  took  to  ascend.'  At 
this  time  Park's  intention  of  a  second  expedition  had  never  been 
revealed  to  Scott,  but  he  instantly  formed  the  opinion  that  these 
experiments  on  the  Yarrow  were  connected  with  some  such 
purpose." 


L'AKT  D'ETRE   GRANDPJillE      181 

Then  again  :  "I  had  a  letter  from  your  good 
mamma  two  days  ago ;  both  she  and  your  papa 
are  very  well  at  Rose  Hill,  Lord  Northesk's 
place.  They  had  a  pleasant  journey,  and  a  fine 
walk  in  Farnham  Park."  Farnham  Park  is  the 
ordinary  residence  of  the  Bishop  of  Winchester ; 
Dean  Rennell  was  his  domestic  chaplain,  and 
lived  there  with  Bishop  Thomas. 

"  The  corn  was  all  down  between  this  and 
Winchester.  If  the  weather  is  fine  next  Wednes- 
day, I  propose  to  myself  the  happiness  of  seeing 
you.  Your  sisters  are  all  well,  and  Alicia  and 
Fanny  send  their  love  ;  so  would  Wilhelmina  if 
she  could  speak,  but  though  she  cannot  she  makes 
herself  understood.  I  suppose  she  must  wonder 
why  she  cannot  speak  as  well  as  everyone  around 
her.  I  shall  be  very  happy  when  your  papa  and 
mamma  return,  for  that  will  be  the  signal  for 
your  speedy  appearance.  When  you  come  I  have 
a  present  for  you  to  make  to  your  good  mamma. 
— Your  affectionate,  G.-P.  J.  Rennell." 

One  can  almost  see  the  little  party  reunited  : 
James  the  Minor,  the  schoolboy,  who  must  have 
been  tall  for  his  age,  the  grandfather  not  very 


182  FROM   THE  PORCH 

tall,  but  gracefully  built,  as  Walckenaer  describes 
him,  active  and  alert,  with  that  gracious  expres- 
sive head  which  is  recorded  by  the  medallion 
in  the  Abbey.  One  can  picture  them  talking 
as  they  advance :  the  dog  Juno  following  in  their 
steps,  as  is  the  way  with  faithful  dogs  ;  the  grand- 
father is  telling  the  boy  such  facts  as  should 
interest  him,  telling  him  of  adventures  and 
experiences,  perhaps  of  leopards  and  natural 
history,  perhaps  of  Captain  Parry's  later  exploits. 
They  turn  from  Portland  Place  into  Nassau 
Street,  where  Major  Rennell  lived  on  for  so  long 
a  time,  where  his  faithful  old  friends  gathered 
round  him  year  after  year,  and  where  his 
daughter  and  his  son-in-law  never  failed  to 
visit  him  sometimes  twice  a  day,  as  he  says. 

The  writer  can  remember  James,  a  tall,  fair, 
handsome  man,  very  simple  and  unaffected,  in 
turn  absorbed  in  his  own  little  boy — who,  it  may 
be  mentioned,  is  now  an  ambassador  and  doing 
credit  to  his  parentage. 

The  letters,  after  various  holiday  excursions 
into  Bedfordshire  and  elsewhere,  finally  reach 
Eton  itself: 

"  I  hope  you  will  find  great  pleasure  in  seeing 


L'ART  D'ETRE  GRANDPERE       183 

the  Montem.  It  must  really  be  a  fine  show. 
So  many  youths  together  form  a  most  delightful 
spectacle  to  feeling  minds.  I  am  always  affected 
when  I  see  a  procession  of  charity  boys  and  girls, 
thinking  what  a  vast  promise  there  is  to  the  next 
generation. 

"  I  hope  the  watch  will  arrive  in  good  health" 
(adds  the  kind  grandpapa). 

The  letters  give  the  news  of  those  days ;  how 
present  some  of  it  still  is,  and  what  familiar 
names  occur.  Major  Rennell  was  naturally  in 
touch  with  others  of  his  kin.  Every  scientific 
man  of  distinction  came  to  him  from  abroad  with 
letters,  from  Humboldt  and  others,  while  over 
here  Sir  Joseph  Banks,  Sir  Hugh  Inglis,  Lord 
Spencer,  Sir  Francis  Beaufort,  were  his  old  per- 
sonal friends,  as  well  as  all  the  Arctic  travellers. 

Apropos  of  Arctic  exploration  in  1824  he 
writes  : 

"  Your  mamma  will  tell  you  a  fine  entertainment 
Captain  Parry  gave  on  board  the  Hecla,  and  the 
weather  proved  very  indulgent,  so  that  it  went 
off  very  well.  Captain  Parry  and  his  com- 
panions, Captain  Lyon  and  Captain  Hoppner, 
will  return  to  the  ice  very  soon.     Captain  Frank- 


184  FROM   THE   PORCH 

lin  does  not  go  yet  awhile.  What  terrible 
hardships  they  must  be  prepared  to  encounter." 

Again,  later  on  :  "  The  Russians  have  certainly 
failed  in  their  plan  of  getting  possession  of  Con- 
stantinople this  time ;  so  much  the  better  for 
Europe.  Although  the  Turks  are  sad  dogs  in 
comparison  with  the  European  nations  at  large, 
yet  Europe  would  suffer  by  having  the  Russians 
in  their  places.  Of  two  evils  we  should  always 
choose  the  least." 

Another  letter  comments  upon  a  visit  little 
James  has  lately  paid  to  Richmond  Hill. 

"  Richmond  from  whose  front  are  eyed. 

Vale,   spires,    meandering   streams   and  Windsor's  tow'ry 
pride." 

So  Major  Rennell  quotes  from  Mr.  Pope.  He 
also  remembers  that  Lord  Palmerston  once  said 
"it  was  the  employment  of  the  gentlemen  who 
lived  at  Richmond  to  drive  to  London  and  back 
again." 

In  February  1826  Major  Rennell  is  writing  of 
James's  birthday : 

"Years  roll  on  [he  says],  and  thus  it  comes 
round  again  to  your  birthday,  and  as  I  have 
no   opportunity   of  embracing   you,   I  can   only 


L'ART   D'ETRE  GRANDPERE      185 

convey  to  you  in  this  way  my  congratulations. 
May  these  anniversaries  return  and  find  you 
as  at  present  in  the  esteem  of  your  friends,  while 
the  Almighty  Ruler  of  all  things  shall  vouchsafe 
to  you  the  possession  of  your  faculties. 

"Your  birthday  will  be  kept  at  Easter  when 
the  Bird  will  fly  in  as  usual,  and  summon  you 
to  Dinner ;  of  which,  I  trust,  I  shall  be  able  to 
partake.  You  know  that  other  great  Folks  keep 
their  Birthdays,  not  on  the  days  on  which  they 
were  born,  but  on  some  other — perhaps  their 
Name  Day,  as  is  the  custom  on  the  Continent. 
I  was  telling  your  good  Papa,  that  in  such  a  case, 
yours  must  be  kept  on  the  1st  May,  or  the  25th 
July  (for  those  are  the  days  of  the  St.  Jameses 
in  the  Calendar),  and  St.  James  the  Less  (the 
1st  May)  ought  to  be  your  day  ;  but  then  he  has 
St.  Philip  quartered  on  him,  and  you  would  not 
give  twopence  for  a  half  Birthday.  Again,  the 
25th  July  is  a  long  way  off;  and  perhaps  I 
ought  to  claim  that  Day  for  myself,  as  that  St. 
James,  the  Son  of  Zebedee,  is  called  St.  James 
the  Major! 

"  I  was  surprised  to  see  how  Mina  was  grown, 
and  to  feel  her  weight.    I  think  Alicia  and  Fanny 


186  FROM   THE  PORCH 

are  much  improved  also.  Mina  said  at  Brighton 
that  she  should  like  to  see  me,  and  then  return 
to  Brighton. 

"  I  forgot  to  write  your  Name  in  the  Book  of 
Maps.  You  had  better  write  it  on  the  inside 
of  the  Cover,  as  the  Maps  will  not  bear  ink.  I 
shall  send  you  two  Notes  to  stick  into  the 
Book. 

"  I  went  out  with  your  Papa  and  Mamma 
yesterday,  for  the  first  time  of  going  out  since 
the  day  on  which  you  returned  to  Eton,  14th 
January. 

"  Believe  me,  my  dearest  James, — Your  affec- 
tionate Grandpapa,  J.  Rennell. 

"  28th  February  1826." 

Again :  "  My  dearest  James, — I  have  re- 
ceived your  very  kind  letters,  three  in  number, 
all  of  which  gave  me  much  pleasure  as  far  as 
concerned  yourself,  but  I  confess  I  felt  it  very 
awful  in  what  related  to  your  neighbours.  These 
explosive  storms,  I  conclude,  are  part  of  the  sys- 
tem by  which  the  purity  of  the  atmosphere  is 
upheld.  When  a  boy  I  was  much  alarmed  at 
lightning,  but  being  at  length  compelled  by  duty 


L'AKT   D'ETEE   GRANDPERE       187 

to  face  it  in  company  with  a  number  of  others,  I 
became  so  accustomed  to  it  that  by  degrees  it 
grew  to  be  an  amusement  to  observe  the  different 
kinds  of  lightning.  Do  you  know  that  sometimes 
lightning  strikes  from  the  ground  to  the  clouds 
— at  others  and  more  commonly  the  contrary  ; 
often  from  one  cloud  to  another,  but  never  re- 
ciprocally. Once  a  mass  of  it  passed  so  near  to 
me  that  I  plainly  smelt  it ;  it  smelt  like  red-hot 
iron  and  made  a  whizzing  noise  like  a  cannon 
ball. 

"  The  gout  still  plagues  me  so  that  I  cannot 
walk  as  usual :  what  your  presence  may  effect 
I  know  not,  but  what  I  possess  is  at  your  service. 
— Your  affectionate  Grandpapa,      J.  Kennell. 

"  \st  July  1826." 

In  1827  he  says:  "I  suppose  you  hear  some- 
thing about  our  Thames  Tunnel.  It  has  lately 
lost  its  way  and  got  into  the  River.  It  is,  how- 
ever, no  joking  concern  to  subscribers,  who  will 
suffer  a  great  loss ;  I  believe  they  did  not  leave 
a  sufficient  thickness  of  ground  between  the 
tunnel  and  the  bottom  of  the  River.  I  always 
regarded  it  as  a  wild  sort  of  plan.  .  .  . 


188  FROM  THE  PORCH 

"I  am  afraid  Mr.  Canning's  health  is  on  the 
decline,  the  cessation  of  his  Parliamentary  Duties 
will  afford  him  much  relief. 

"  I  remain,  my  dear  James, — Your  very  affec- 
tionate G.-P.,  J.  Rennell." 

The  shades  are  beginning  to  close  in,  but  he 
writes  still  cheerfully  on  the  19th  of  June  1827  : 

"My  dear  James, — I  have  long  been  your 
debtor,  for  want  of  being  able  to  pay  you.  Three 
of  your  very  kind  letters  now  lie  before  me  as 
if  reproaching  me  for  my  neglecting  them.  The 
truth  is,  that  my  right  hand  has  suffered  very 
much  (the  left  still  more),  and  for  a  long  time 
it  was  very  painful  to  use  the  finger  and  thumb, 
nor  have  I  been  able  to  walk  across  the  room. 
My  friends,  however,  do  not  desert  me,  for  I 
seldom  miss  having  company  every  day,  and  very 
commonly  ladies.  Your  Papa  and  Mamma  I 
see  every  day,  and  sometimes  more  than  once, 
your  sisters  also  .  .  .  but  I  cannot  return  any 
of  their  visits.  20th. — Your  sister  Alicia  came 
home  yesterday.  She  is  wonderfully  tall,  and 
looks  very  well.  You  remember  Lord  Abercorn's 
shrubbery — '  Nothing  to  do,  hut  to  grow' 


L'ART   D'ETRE   GKANDPERE       189 

"  I  congratulate  you  on  your  accession  to  the 
Fifth  Form.  Martin  Thackeray  was  expatiating 
on  the  subject." 

II 

These  extracts  speak  for  themselves,  but 
before  ending  this  little  paper  it  is  meet  to 
dwell  for  a  moment  not  only  on  James's  grand- 
father, but  on  the  Major  himself  in  his  long 
and  gallant  career  and  life  of  faithful  work, 
inspired  by  that  natural  genius  for  observation 
which  was  his  own.  From  his  early  youth  to 
his  gentle  old  age,  this  wise  and  charming  philo- 
sopher never  ceased  to  follow  the  gleam  as  it 
shone  for  him. 

Baron  Walckenaer,  as  Secretary  of  the  Insti- 
tute of  France,  wrote  a  fine  tribute  to  "Jacques 
Rennell"  (so  he  calls  him),  who  for  thirty  years 
had  been  associated  as  a  member  of  the  Institute. 

"  The  hydrographical  problems  which  young 
llennell  grasped  presented  special  difficulties 
[says  the  Baron].  In  order  to  triumph  over 
them  it  was  necessary  to  join  to  Knowledge 
and  to  Practice,  Patience,  Courage,  Presence  of 
Mind,  none  of  which  could  be  allowed  to  relax 


190  FROM  THE  PORCH 

for  a  single  instant  during  the  course  of  the 
operations.  It  is  necessary  in  such  experiments 
as  his,  to  consult  almost  simultaneously  the 
earth,  the  heavens  and  the  sea,  to  add  the 
movements  of  the  planets  to  those  horizons,  of 
which  the  sinuosities,  the  heights  and  the  aspects 
are  being  measured.  When  the  problems  con- 
cern the  moving  and  capricious  surface  of  the 
waters,  the  level  must  be  measured  every 
quarter  of  an  hour ;  and  you  have  to  concert 
measures  with  other  observers  on  the  shore, 
besides  sounding  the  depths  of  the  sea.  Some 
of  these  observations,  wearying  and  often  accom- 
panied by  danger,  have  to  be  repeated  twenty, 
forty  times,  if  one  wishes  to  avoid  errors,  of 
which  the  slightest  might  occasion  such  serious 
disaster.  .  .  ." 

Baron  Walckenaer  writes  no  less  sympatheti- 
cally of  the  end  than  of  the  beginning  of  this 
fine  career.  "  Long  after  the  Major  had  been 
obliged  by  the  state  of  his  health  to  give  up  all 
society,  a  certain  number  of  friends  still  came 
to  visit  him  at  fixed  hours,  sitting  with  him  by 
the  large  table  where  lay  spread  the  maps,  the 
compasses,    the   books    necessary    for   the    work 


L'ART   D'ETRE   GRANDPfiRE       191 

upon  which  he  was  engaged.  When  the  con- 
versation fell  upon  subjects  upon  which  he  was 
an  authority,  he  had  an  art  all  his  own  of  in- 
culcating his  facts  with  so  much  simplicity  and 
clearness  that  people  seemed  to  remember  that 
which  he  was  teaching  them  at  the  time." 

Titles  and  recognition  were  less  common  in  the 
I700's  than  they  are  now,  but,  nevertheless, 
respect  and  admiration  existed  then  as  happily 
they  do  still.  I  happened  once,  when  he  was 
over  here  not  long  ago,  to  mention  Major 
Rennell's  name  to  Major  Sykes,  H.M.  Consul- 
General  in  Persia  (well  known  himself  for  his 
work  and  varied  attainments),  and  he  burst 
out  in  warm  and  vivid  praise  of  one  whose 
teaching,  he  said,  he  had  followed  all  his  life 
with  an  ever-increasing  respect. 

"  Undoubtedly  the  first  great  English  geo- 
grapher," says  Sir  Clements  Markham,  writing 
of  Major  Rennell  in  the  "  Century  Science  "  series. 

Sir  Edward  Thackeray,  in  his  Biographies  of 
the  Royal  Bengal  Engineers,  gives  this  story  of 
Major  Rennell.     He  says  of  him  : 

"  Among  his  eager  fortune-seeking  country- 
men.  Major   Rennell   stands   forth   as  a   unique 


192  FROM  THE   PORCH 

figure — a  calm,  disinterested  man  of  science. 
When  the  Peace  of  Paris  in  1763  seemed  to  end 
his  chances  in  the  British  Navy,  he  received 
an  ensign's  commission  in  the  Bengal  Engineers, 
and  was  appointed  surveyor  of  the  Company's 
dominions  in  Bengal,  and  during  these  years 
some  of  his  most  eventful  experiences  befell 
him." 

Major  Rennell's  own  account  of  one  of  his 
experiences  with  the  "  Facqueers,"  as  he  calls 
them,  is  well  worth  quoting  at  length.  He  was 
reconnoitring  the  country  on  the  borders  of 
Bhutan  at  the  time.  (How  often  little  James 
must  have  asked  for  the  story  which  his  grand- 
father tells  in  a  letter  to  a  friend.) 

"  Suddenly  we  found  ourselves  in  front  of  two 
lines  of  '  Facqueers '  drawn  up  in  the  market- 
place [so  he  writes  in  August  1766].  Our  escort 
found  it  high  time  to  retreat,  but  we  thought 
it  rather  too  late,  for  the  enemy  had  drawn  their 
swords  and  surrounded  us.  One  of  the  officers 
escaped  unhurt,  the  other  with  a  slight  wound 
after  fighting  his  way  through.  As  for  myself 
I  was  so  entirely  surrounded  that  I  never  ex- 
pected to   escape,  but  having  the  good  fortune 


L'ART   D'ETRE   GRANDPl^.RE       193 

to  preserve  my  sword,  I  defended  myself  pretty 
well  in  front  and  kept  retreating  backwards  till 
I  had  very  few  behind  me  when  I  turned  and 
fled  for  it.  A  hardy  fellow  followed  me  close, 
but  paid  the  price  of  his  life ;  the  rest  of  them 
thinking  me  too  much  wounded  to  run  far, 
remained  in  their  places,  but  kept  a  continual 
firing  on  me  till  I  was  out  of  sight.  Providence 
must  have  strengthened  my  arms  while  I  was 
retreating,  for  now  I  found  both  of  them  deprived 
of  their  strength.  Indeed,  no  wonder,  one  of 
them  was  cut  in  three  places,  and  the  shoulder- 
bone  belonging  to  the  other  divided.  One  stroke 
of  a  sabre  liad  cut  my  right  shoulder-bone 
through,  and  laid  me  open  for  nearly  a  foot, 
besides  a  large  cut  in  the  hand,  which  has 
deprived  me  of  the  use  of  my  forefinger.   .  .  ." 

For  surgical  aid  Rennell  had  to  be  sent  to 
Dacca,  three  hundred  miles  off,  in  an  open  boat, 
which  he  had  to  direct  himself,  as  he  lay  upon 
his  face,  while  the  natives  applied  onions  as 
cataplasm  to  the  wounds.  He  was  long  given 
up,  but  under  the  care  of  Dr.  Russell  recovered, 
though  his  health  was  seriously  shaken  by  the 
loss  of  blood  and  severity  of  the  wounds. 


194  FEOM   THE   PORCH 

Among  many  subsequent  adventures,  we  are 
told  of  him  one  day  "  marching  in  India  at  the 
head  of  a  detachment,"  and  as  we  read  in  the 
European  Magazine,  "  he  was  suddenly  attacked 
by  a  '  tyger.'  With  great  coolness  he  received 
the  animal  on  the  point  of  the  bayonet,  which 
he  thrust  down  his  throat  and  so  despatched  him, 
but  it  appears  that  the  bayonet  was  much  bent." 

The  Major's  own  account  of  the  affair  makes 
the  "tyger"  into  a  leopard — "Five  of  my  men 
were  wounded  by  him,  four  very  dangerously. 
You  see  I  am  a  lucky  fellow  at  all  times," 
says  he. 

It  was  in  the  year  1772,  after  the  fight  with 
the  "  Facqueers,"  that  Major  Rennell  was 
married  to  Miss  Jane  Thackeray,  my  father's 
great-aunt.  There  is  a  family  tradition,  which 
I  may  be  allowed  to  mention,  that  when  this 
young  lady  departed  from  her  home  to  stay  in 
Bengal  with  her  youngest  brother,  the  W.  M. 
Thackeray  of  those  days,  Mrs.  Thackeray,  the 
experienced  mother  of  sixteen,  exclaimed  :  "If 
there  is  a  sensible  man  in  all  India  he  will  find 
out  our  Jenny." 

Jenny     and     her     beautiful     younger     sister 


L'ART   D'ETRE   GEANDPME       195 

Henrietta  had  started  for  India  at  the  in- 
vitation of  their  youngest  brother,  the  original 
WilHam  Makepeace  Thackeray,  my  father's 
namesaKe  and  grandfather,  a  protege  of  Mr. 
Cartier,  the  Lieutenant-Governor  of  Bengal. 
It  was  at  Mr.  Cartier's  house  that  the  Thackerays 
made  the  acquaintance  of  "  the  sensible  man,"  so 
we  read  in  the  History  of  the  Thackerays  in  India. 

The  marriage  was  a  happy  one ;  but  some 
years  after.  Major  Rennell's  health  having  failed 
from  the  hardships  he  had  gone  through,  the 
couple  came  back  to  England.  Both  their  sons 
died  comparatively  young,  but  the  daughter 
Jane  remained  to  them.  She  married  a  naval 
captain,  afterwards  Admiral  Sir  John  Tremayne 
Rodd,  and,  as  I  have  said,  was  the  mother  of 
little  James,  to  whom  the  letters  are  addressed. 
Old  friends  used  to  say  how  proud  Major  Bennell 
was  of  his  daughter's  beauty  and  abilities,  and 
she  herself  has  related  that  her  father  had  said 
to  her :  "  You  may  always  rely  on  your  own 
judgment  if  it  is  on  a  subject  you  understand ; 
if  not,  take  advice."  She  was  thus  able  to  edit 
some  of  his  unfinished  writings  after  his  death. 

Mrs.  Bennell  died  first ;  Major  Bennell  lived 


196  FROM   THE   PORCH 

on  till  he  was  over  87  in  his  quiet  retreat  with 
the  faithful  old  housekeeper.  As  we  have  seen, 
his  grandchildren,  his  old  friends,  his  daughter 
and  his  son-in-law,  never  left  him  long  alone. 

This  is  an  age  of  pictures.  There  are  few 
people  who  do  not  love  them.  Besides  the 
actual  representations  of  things  that  we  see  with 
our  eyes,  and  the  images  of  the  benefactors 
we  have  actually  known,  there  are  also  those 
pictures  which  we  paint  for  ourselves,  memory- 
pictures,  hope-pictures,  wishing- pictures,  all  de- 
picted upon  that  mysterious  atmosphere  which 
surrounds  our  life  as  it  passes.  It  sometimes 
happens  that  these  visions  show  us  men  and 
women  who  never  knew  us,  who  died  long 
before  we  were  born,  and  yet  who  are  actually 
a  part  of  our  lives  and  in  some  way  still  with  us 
and  full  of  help  and  sympathy,  and  encourage- 
ment. Major  Rennell  is  one  of  these ;  he  had 
a  personal  charm  for  his  contemporaries,  as  he 
has  had  for  many  of  those  who  have  followed. 
His  daughter,  his  grandson,  and  his  grandson's 
wife  ever  retained  a  devoted  affection  for  his 
memory. 


L'AIiT   D'ETRE   GRANDPERE       197 

"Rennell  was  of  medium  height,  well  pro- 
portioned, of  a  grave  yet  sweet  expression  of 
countenance.  The  miniature  painted  for  Lord 
Spencer  represents  him  sitting  in  his  arm-chair 
as  in  reflection.  He  was  diflident  and  unassum- 
ing, but  ever  ready  to  impart  information."  So 
writes  Sir  Clements  Markham  in  the  Dictionary 
of  National  Biography,  that  CamjJO  Santo 
where  the  honoured  names  of  those  who  have 
done  well  for  their  country  are  recorded. 

After  Major  Rennell's  death,  when  he  was 
laid  to  his  rest  in  Westminster  Abbey  on  April  6, 
1830,  the  old  friends  who  had  come  so  faithfully, 
and  with  so  much  regard,  to  the  little  house  in 
Nassau  Street,  put  up  a  monument  to  his  memory. 
It  is  at  the  entrance  of  Poet's  Corner — it  depicts 
a  refined  and  charming  head  with  the  old- 
fashioned  collar  and  tie  wig  of  the  period ;  I 
can  see  in  it  some  look  of  my  old  benefactress 
as  I  look  at  it,  and  of  one  of  her  grandchildren. 
The  hand  of  that  erratic  sculptor.  Nature,  gives 
us  from  time  to  time  glimpses  of  those  who  have 
lived,  whose  children  and  grandchildren  look 
at  us  still  with  their  eyes  and  speak  to  us  with 
their  voices. 


MORLAND   AT   FRESHWATER    BAY 

I 

It  is  with  a  delightful  response  that  one  comes 
upon  Morland's  well-known  picture  of  "  The 
Stable  "  in  the  National  Gallery.  I  was  actually 
searching  for  it  when  my  admiration  was  arrested 
by  a  vision  of  harmonious,  tranquil  life.  A 
peaceful  gleam  rather  than  a  picture  met  my 
gaze,  and  as  I  looked  I  realised  that  this  was 
what  I  was  seeking.  All  in  it  is  natural,  in- 
evitable, as  the  greatest  and  best  must  always 
seem. 

The  day  is  ending ;  the  horses  and  the  pony 
are  led  home,  contentedly  returning  from  their 
toil.  The  stableman  stoops  to  collect  the  pro- 
vender ;  the  light  flows  in,  shaded  from  without 
by  the  piece  of  irradiated  sacking,  and  as  it 
illumines  the  homely  things — the  wheelbarrow, 
the  spade,  the  old  lantern — these  very  imple- 
ments seem  also  at  rest.  Toil  is  over ;  the  hour 
of  peace  has  come. 

198 


MORLAND   AT   FRESHWATER   BAY  199 

There  are  other  fine  pictures  by  Morland,  but 
nothing  seems  quite  so  good  as  this  one,  which, 
so  I  have  been  told,  was  bought  and  presented 
to  the  nation  by  a  generous  benefactor.  But 
though  nothing  is  perhaps  quite  equal  to  "  The 
Stable,"  one  is  dazzled  by  the  wealth  of  the 
stream  which  comes  flowing  from  the  easel  of 
this  ardent  workman.  Sometimes  one  is  dis- 
appointed in  his  work,  which  seems  to  have  been 
alternately  a  torrent  of  realisation,  of  vitality, 
and  a  drifting  waste  of  fine  material. 

In  his  early  youth  horses  were  his  delight ;  he 
rode  in  steeplechases.  He  was  a  fine  musician  as 
well  as  a  painter  ;  he  was  a  gay  and  generous 
companion,  a  happy  vagrant  all  through  life, 
spending  recklessly,  giving  out  bountifully  to 
the  end.  He  might  have  claimed  a  baronetcy,  but 
he  refused,  and  said,  "  Better  be  a  fine  painter 
than  a  fine  gentleman." 

George  Morland  was  born  in  1764.  He  was 
the  son  of  Henry  Morland,  also  an  artist,  from 
whom  he  received  whatever  tuition  he  had  in 
drawing  and  painting.  We  read  how,  as  a  boy, 
he  was  made  to  work  so  hard  that  when  he 
reached    manhood     he    went    to     the    opposite 


200  FROM   THE   PORCH 

extreme,  and  his  life  was  wild,  amusing,  and 
agreeable.  He  married  the  sister  of  William 
Ward,  the  mezzotint  engraver  (who  reproduced 
so  many  of  his  pictures).  Morland  loved  his 
wife,  but  after  a  short  time  of  married  life, 
grew  tired  of  domestic  monotony,  quarrelled 
with  his  brother-in-law,  and  once  more  returned 
to  Bohemian  ways.  His  health  broke  down ; 
he  owed  money,  and  was  imprisoned  for  debt. 
One  of  his  pictures  is  a  scene  representing  a 
half-naked  prisoner  being  relieved  by  two  kind 
benefactors. 

Morland  fled  from  debts  and  bailiffs — per- 
haps he  rather  enjoyed  flying  from  his  creditors 
— and  finally  came  to  the  Isle  of  Wight  and 
painted  many  of  its  aspects. 

There  is  that  wonderful  episode  related  in  his 
life  when,  being  at  breakfast  at  six  o'clock  in  the 
morning  at  Yarmouth  in  the  island,  preparing  for 
his  day's  work,  a  corporal  and  a  file  of  soldiers 
marched  in  and  took  him  off  to  Newport  as  a 
spy,  wearily  trudging  him  through  the  blazing 
sun.  Happily  one  of  the  magistrates  set  him 
free,  and  from  Yarmouth  and  Newport  he  seems 
to  have  found  his  way  to  Freshwater  Bay. 


MOELAND   AT   FRESHWATER   BAY   201 

Coming  out  of  Farrlngford  Lane,  where  the 
thrushes  still  sing  as  they  did  in  the  laureate's 
time,  and  the  downs  shine  beyond  the  fragrant 
hedges,  you  pass  between  them,  still  following 
the  road  to  the  foot  of  the  hill,  where  one  or  two 
patient  loiterers  stand  watching  the  passers-by ; 
finally,  you  come  to  a  little  sea-terrace  marked 
by  a  few  posts  and  chains.  Perhaps  as  you  look 
about  a  gull  sails  by  on  tranquil  extended  pinions, 
you  see  a  few  bathing-machines  huddled  among 
the  waste  and  lumber  of  the  shore,  and  on  the 
opposite  cliff  a  long  low  inn  of  only  two  stories 
marked  by  a  flagstaff.  It  is  now  called  the 
Albion.  A  hundred  years  ago  a  little  public- 
house,  the  Mermaid,  stood  on  the  self-same  spot ; 
it  was  a  very  humble  Mermaid  and  a  place  of 
meeting,  so  we  are  told,  for  smugglers  and 
fishermen.  It  is  in  full  range  of  the  broad  sea- 
breezes  ;  on  stormy  days  the  waves  still  come 
from  a  great  distance,  sending  sudden  fountains 
of  spray  against  the  low  windows.  The  Stag 
rocks  are  opposite ;  on  the  other  side,  the  fort 
half-way  up  the  cliff  leads  to  High  Down  and 
to  its  beacon  wrapped  in  changing  lights.  Gulls 
fly  across  the  line  of  the  cliff,  countless  rabbits 


202  FROM   THE   PORCH 

scamper  along  the  turf.  The  ancient  wooden 
beacon  has  been  replaced  by  Tennyson's  cross, 
but  nothing  else  is  very  different  from  the  time 
— a  hundred  years  ago — when  George  Morland 
looked  out  with  his  flashing  dark  eyes  and  saw 
it  all.  Here  in  little  Freshwater  he  lived  for  a 
time  and  worked  and  joined  the  wild  revellers 
who  then  frequented  the  humble  tavern.  There 
is  the  story  of  the  friend  who  reproached  him 
for  keeping  such  humble  company  and  dragged 
him  reluctantly  away  from  the  bar.  But  once 
outside,  Morland  produced  his  sketch-book. 
"  Look  at  this,"  said  he  ;  "  where  else  could  I 
find  such  models?"  and  there  were  the  admir- 
able drawings  of  the  men  drinking  within. 

"George  Morland,"  says  Mr.  Richardson,  "the 
successor  of  Reynolds  and  Romney,  of  Hogarth, 
of  Gainsborough,  was,  like  Burns,  absolutely 
original,  averse  to  seeking  knowledge  in  any 
academy  but  that  of  nature." 

In  Mr.  Wedmore's  Studies  in  English  Art, 
writing  of  landscape,  he  says:  "Gainsborough 
had  discovered  a  mine  which  others  would 
more  profitably  work.  He  had  set  an  example, 
and  others  would  follow   it,  though    the   result 


MORLAND  AT   FRESHWATER  BAY   203 

of  their  following  would  vary  with  their  in- 
dividual gifts.  Two  men  who  worked  in  part 
during  his  later  life,  and  in  chief  after  its  close, 
I  connect  especially  with  Gainsborough.  The 
art  of  each  had  a  new  element,  but  the  art  of 
both  was  the  child  of  Gainsborough.  One  of 
these  men  was  George  Morland ;  the  other, 
Francis  Wheatley." 

To  go  on  quoting  from  Mr.  Wed  more :  "To 
high  dramatic  expression  Morland  did  not  seek 
to  attain  ;  to  subtle  and  fine  feeling  he  hardly 
pretended ;  but  unconcerned  with  the  modern 
landscapist's  philosophy,  or  any  wider  vision 
than  that  which  lay  before  his  own  peasant  as 
he  trudged  home  from  his  work,  or  his  own 
fisherman  as  he  mended  the  nets  on  the  beach, 
or  his  own  shepherd  as  he  paused  at  midday 
to  take  from  his  wallet  his  meal,  while  the  good 
dogs  barked  around  him — unconcerned  with  any 
wider  vision  than  that  of  these,  Morland  did 
slowly  build  up  for  us  a  picture  of  the  rougher 
England  of  that  day." 

Many  of  Morland's  prints  and  drawings  are 
still  to  be  found  in  the  island.  From  the 
cottages  they  have  gradually  drifted  to  the  halls 


204  FROM   THE  PORCH 

and  homes  of  the  well-to-do.  Mrs.  Orchard  at 
the  Freshwater  Post  Office  has  a  charming  col- 
lection of  Morland's  sketches  as  well  as  some  of 
those  of  his  colleagues  and  imitators. 

Among  her  prints  is  one  called  "  The  Fern 
Gatherers,"  a  print  after  Morland,  published  in 
1799,  17|  by  23f.  It  is  curious  as  being  the 
original  of  a  charming  duplicate  in  water  colour 
by  Ward.  The  water  colour  has  also  been 
engraved,  and  is  called  "  The  Fern  Burners." 
In  it  only  a  part  of  the  first  picture  is  repeated. 
The  figure  of  a  gipsy  is  altogether  omitted,  and 
the  position  of  another  slightly  altered.  The 
plate  of  this  "  Fern  Burners "  has  been  de- 
stroyed. 

II 

It  is  a  long  way  from  Freshwater  Gate  to 
Queen  Anne's  Gate  at  the  Westminster  end 
of  St.  James's  Park,  where  in  a  stately  old 
mansion  traces  of  Morland's  life-work  are  also 
to  be  found — early  and  fanciful  studies  in  his 
finished  early  style,  so  unlike  his  broader  later 
manner :  "  Idleness,"  the  tranquil  lady  in  white 


MORLAND   AT   FRESHWATER   BAY   205 

attire  with  her  Httle  dog  to  keep  her  company ; 
"  Industry,"  the  most  charming  and  leisurely  of 
industries,  with  her  broad  black  hat  so  deftly 
poised  upon  her  elaborate  locks  and  with  pretty 
red  slippers  resting  on  a  footstool.  She  delicately 
stitches  at  arm's  length  while  the  light  falls  upon 
her  sampler.  In  the  hall  of  the  same  old  house 
the  well-known  children  playing  at  soldiers  are 
to  be  seen,  with  that  dear  little  girl  in  the  fore- 
ground looking  on.  Still  more  delightful  are 
those  infants  of  the  past  robbing  the  orchard  of 
long-stolen  apples.  They  are  dressed  in  ancient 
little  knee-breeches  and  shoe-buckles.  For  a 
century  past  the  little  scapegrace  has  come 
scrambling  from  the  branches,  while  another 
clutches  at  the  fallen  fruit.  It  is  all  delicate, 
natural ;  at  the  same  time  we  may  realise 
Morland's  great  advance  as  time  went  on.  At 
the  Victoria  and  Albert  Museum  I  found  one 
picture  which  appealed  to  me,  that  of  the  fisher- 
men hauling  in  a  boat  from  the  sea.  I  thought 
I  could  recognise  the  very  place  in  Freshwater 
Bay.  The  waves  of  the  sea  are  alive,  the  clouds 
are  alive,  the  dog  is  alive,  even  the  cliffs  are 
alive  in   their  own  fashion ;  only  the  fishermen 


206  FROM  THE   PORCH 

are  not  alive  as  they  haul  in  the  boat,  though 
the  craft  is  yielding  to  their  pull  and  the  wind 
blows  their  hair  and  their  clothing. 

His  anatomy  may  have  failed  somewhat,  but 
he  could  paint  time,  he  could  paint  rest,  he  could 
paint  the  essence  of  life,  and  his  wayward 
attraction,  strange  being  that  he  was,  adds 
something  not  to  be  ignored  to  its  realisation. 
With  so  many  selves  to  enjoy,  with  so  many 
qualities  to  squander,  his  music,  his  riding,  his 
love  of  animals,  his  love  of  children,  his  jovial 
charity,  his  prodigal  companionship,  he  should 
have  been  a  greater  man.  Morland  as  he  grew 
older  took  a  wider  view  of  life  and  nature  than 
in  his  youth.  He  must  have  been  a  lovable 
person.  His  wife  died  of  grief  when  she  learnt 
his  death.  She  owed  him  love ;  we  owe  to  him 
a  new  delight  in  natural  things. 

How  often  it  is  the  thought  of  the  others  who 
have  passed  before  us  that  gives  a  personal  soul 
and  meaning  to  nature  itself. 

Freshwater,  where  Morland  once  came,  has 
its  own  beloved  traditions,  traditions  greater 
than  Morland's,  and  coming  after  him,  and  it 
echoes  with  the  footsteps   which    still    seem    to 


MOELAND   AT   FRESHWATER   BAY   207 

be  crossing  the   downs  and  treading  the  lanes 
and  the  meadows  all  around. 

*  A  friend  shows  ine  this  cutting  from  The  Athenwum,  April  2(5, 
1913 :  "  Engravings  after  Morland  fetched  the  following  prices : 
'The  Story  of  Letitia,'  by  J.  R  Smith  (set  of  six),  £8G1  ;  '  A  Visit 
to  the  Boarding  School '  and  '  A  Visit  to  the  Child  at  Nurse,'  by 
W.  Ward  (a  pair),  £420  ;  'Children  Playing  at  Soldiers,'  £'-231. " 


ALFRED   STEVENS 

A  SHRINE  on  the  Westminster  Embankment, 
no  less  sacred  to  Art  than  those  classic 
monuments  dedicated  to  Apollo  and  the  Muses, 
or  that  lovely  temple  of  Venus  which  is  still 
standing  by  the  flowing  Tiber,  is  happily  to 
be  seen  any  day  by  the  passer-by  reflected  in 
the  waters  of  the  Thames ;  flights  of  easy  steps 
lead  up  to  the  open  portals,  inviting  and  open 
to  all.  But  a  few  days  ago  the  votaries  were 
assembling  in  numbers  to  testify  their  devout 
gratitude  for  the  gifts  of  beauty  and  expression 
which  are  to  be  found  in  the  Tate  Gallery, 
and  of  which  every  day  brings  more  and  more 
interesting  examples.  On  this  special  occasion, 
Lord  Plymouth  opened  the  proceedings  by  intro- 
ducing Sir  William  Richmond,  who  made  the 
presentation  of  the  bust  of  Alfred  Stevens  by 
Professor  Lanteri,  and  the  fine  model  of  mouldino^s 
from  Holford  House ;  paying  generous  tribute 
to   To-day   as   well    as    to    Yesterday,    and    to 

208 


ALFRED  STEVENS  209 

Stevens's  "  indomitable  will  and  commanding 
love  for  all  forms  of  artistic  expression."  .  .  . 
"  Fashions  were  fugitive,  he  said,  but  great  art 
was  eternal."  .  .  .  Among  those  who  listened 
to  this  voice,  and  to  others  which  so  fitly  fol- 
lowed, was  the  President  of  the  "  Alfred  Stevens 
Memorial  Committee,"  M.  Alphonse  Legros, 
warmly  and  enthusiastically  welcomed  by  the 
younger  men,  as  he  slowly  advanced  to  the  front 
bearing  with  dignity  all  the  weight  of  his 
honoured  years.  It  was  a  moment  not  to  be 
forgotten ;  the  old  man  entered  the  hall,  the 
younger  generation  rose  to  receive  him,  advanc- 
ing with  outstretched  hands  and  eager  response 
to  lead  him  to  his  chair.  It  was  Legros's  last 
public  appearance,  and  the  legitimate  satisfaction 
of  his  long  and  generous  desire  for  the  recogni- 
tion of  Stevens's  genius. 

We  cannot  do  better  than  quote  a  few  sen- 
tences from  the  introductory  note  to  the  Catalogue 
of  the  Alfred  Stevens's  Loan  Collection  at  the 
Tate  Gallery,  opened  on  the  15th  of  November 
1911  : 

"  It  had  long  been  the  desire  of  Professor 
Legros  that  a  monument  to  Stevens  should  find 


210  FROM   THE   PORCH 

a  place  in  the  Gallery  of  British  Art.  The 
memorial  committee  was  formed  under  his 
presidency,  and  raised  the  funds  necessary  to 
add  the  reproduction  of  the  chimney-piece  to 
the  memorial  bust ;  these  now  take  their  place 
in  what  will  be  for  the  future  a  Stevens's  room. 

"  The  design  for  the  completed  monument  of 
the  Duke  of  Wellington  is  to  be  seen  at  the 
South  Kensington  Museum,  '  with  the  equestrian 
statue,'  as  the  Catalogue  tells  us,  '  ruled  out  by 
a  caprice  of  the  Dean.'  " 

Some  work  seems  complete  in  its  moment, 
other  seems  to  belong  to  that  "eternal  world 
of  great  Art "  ;  and  as  we  look  at  the  drawings 
and  noble  designs  which  are  left  to  us  by  Alfred 
Stevens,  this  man  of  yesterday,  who  died  too 
early  to  reap  the  recognition  of  his  genius,  we 
are  carried  back  to  Michael  Angelo,  to  Leonardo, 
to  the  mighty  powers  of  the  past.  Perhaps  our 
generation  is  in  some  measure  better  able  to 
appreciate  great  work  than  many  of  those  which 
immediately  preceded  it.  It  is  certainly  not 
behindhand  in  giving  Stevens  his  due. 

When  the  seeding  time  at  last  comes  round, 
thoughts  are  scattered   and    carried    far   afield ; 


ALFRED   STEVENS  211 

names  seem  to  be  in  the  air.  Of  late  the  name 
of  Alfred  Stevens  has  echoed  from  every  side, 
conjured  out  of  the  silence.  Sculptor,  painter, 
decorator,  he  was  an  artist  in  the  largest, 
truest  sense,  a  lifelong  follower  of  truth  and 
beauty. 

He  was  born  in  1818  at  Blandford  Fordham, 
in  Dorsetshire.  His  father  was  a  house- painter 
who  practised  the  collateral  trades  or  branches 
of  decoration,  sign-painting  and  heraldic  work. 
The  elder  Stevens  was  considered  a  clever  man 
by  his  neighbours ;  some  of  them  were  still 
alive  when  Mr.  Stannus  visited  the  town  about 
eighteen  years  ago.  Alfred  worked  with  his 
father  from  the  age  of  eleven  to  fifteen.  Tlien 
the  Rector  of  an  adjacent  village,  who  greatly 
admired  his  gifts,  gave  fifty  pounds  towards  his 
education  as  a  painter,  and  it  was  agreed  that 
he  should  be  sent  to  study  in  London.  The 
boy  evinced  a  vocation  for  drawing  animals,  and 
Sir  Edwin  Landseer  was  chosen  as  a  suitable 
master,  but,  happily  for  Stevens's  career.  Sir 
Edwin  did  not  take  pupils  under  five  hundred 
pounds — a  far  larger  sum  than  was  forthcoming — 
it  was  therefore  settled  that  the  young  student 


212  FROM   THE   PORCH 

should  go  to  Italy  and  there  prepare  himself  for 
an  artistic  career. 

A  portrait  of  Alfred*  Stevens,  designed  by 
himself  about  this  time,  is  very  delightful.  The 
boy  looks  out  from  the  page  with  intelligent 
brown  eyes,  he  wears  his  thick  brown  hair  some- 
what long ;  his  expression  is  already  full  of 
character  and  determination,  the  strong  per- 
sonality impresses  itself  as  one  looks  at  it ;  a 
painter  is  always  the  best  depictor  of  himself. 

The  author  of  Ereivhon  says  somewhere : 
"  A  great  portrait  is  always  more  a  portrait 
of  the  painter  than  of  the  painted.  When 
we  look  at  a  portrait  by  Holbein  or  Rem- 
brandt, it  is  of  Holbein  or  Rembrandt  we  think, 
more  than  of  the  subject  of  their  pictures. 
Even  a  portrait  of  Shakespeare  by  Holbein  or 
Rembrandt  could  tell  us  very  little  about  Shake- 
speare. It  would,  however,  tell  us  a  great  deal 
about  Holbein  or  Rembrandt."  This  seems  to 
apply  especially  to  Stevens  and  his  work,  and 
to  this  boyish  portrait  from  which  one  un- 
doubtedly learns  a  great  deal  of  the  man-to-be. 

Alfred  Stevens  arrived  at  Naples  in  October 
1833  ;  he  had  sixty  pounds  in  his  pocket,  much 


ALFKED   STEVENS  213 

good  advice  from  his  friends,  and  special  injunc- 
tions that  he  was  to  study  the  works  of  Salvator 
Kosa,  who  at  that  time  was  very  much  the 
fashion ;  but  he  rejected  Salvator,  and  instead 
of  following  the  conventional  path,  he  struck 
out  an  entirely  original  one  of  his  own  devising, 
and  worked  hard  at  it  makintr  studies  from  the 
works  of  Giotto,  and  copying  any  of  the  pictures 
of  Andrea  del  Sarto  that  he  found  in  the 
Galleries.  The  excavations  of  Pompeii  were  just 
then  in  full  progress,  and  we  find  an  exquisite 
little  water-colour  in  the  Tate  Gallery  which  is 
described  in  the  Catalogue  as  "A  study  of  a 
street  in  Pompeii,  with  touches  of  colour,  show- 
ing the  source  of  much  of  Stevens's  inspiration 
in  decoration.'"  "  A  study  of  a  purple  single 
peony,  an  early  work,"  hangs  above  it,  a  lovely, 
delicate  drawing  of  a  peony  flowering,  nearly  a 
hundred  years  ago,  and  not  to  be  forgotten.  In 
the  same  room  we  find  two  striking  oil  pictures ; 
one  is  the  portrait  of  a  young  man,  the  other 
evidently  that  of  an  artist.  The  smaller  picture 
represents  a  painter  sitting  in  a  perfectly  bare 
room  or  studio  ;  it  is  carpetless,  paperless,  the  walls 
are  grey  and  discoloured,  a  black  stove  is  the  only 


214  FROM   THE   PORCH 

ornament ;  there  is  also  a  shabby  doorway  to  be 
seen,  stained  by  time.     But  the  emptiness  is  not 
empty,  the  bareness  is   not   bare,   the   light   is 
there    shining    from    those    walls    of    luminous 
grey.     One  is  arrested  by  the  delicate,  expres- 
sive face.     There  are  no  adjuncts,  except  truth 
indeed  and  life.     The  dress  is  that  of  the  early 
Victorian  time,  the  high-collared  coat,  the  black 
neck-tie  tied  in  a  heavy  bow,  the  hair  not  cropped 
as    now,    but    allowed   to   grow :    it   all   arrests 
you,  no   less  than   did    the   picturesque   figures 
who  once  worked   (as  they  still  do)  in  artistic 
garb,   who  wore  fur  for    their   painter's   livery, 
broad  hats  like  Rubens  and  Vandyke.     It  may, 
to  some  of  us,  be  a  new  lesson  to  realise  that  art 
is    to    be    found    everywhere,    not   in    beautiful 
things  only,  but  in  plain  and  obvious  ones,  in 
reserve  as  well  as  in  superfluity.     As  an  instance 
of  the  value  of  the  homely  in  a  kindred  art  may 
we  not  quote  the  works  of  Hardy  and  Meredith. 
When  Stevens  left  Naples  at  last   it  was  on 
foot,   and   he   slowly   made   his   way    to   Rome, 
putting  up  at  night  in  the  wayside  inns,  where 
in  order  to  pay  for  his  lodging  and  food  he  sold 
pencil  portraits  brushed  over  with  colour.      He 


ALFRED  STEVENS  215 

led  the  strenuous  life  of  a  painter  of  old,  he 
travelled  from  place  to  place,  always  observing, 
always  learning  and  improving.  Finally,  he 
came  to  Florence,  where  he  stayed  for  three 
years,  and  we  are  told  that  his  aptitude  for 
anatomy  was  such  that  his  teacher  advised  him 
to  take  to  surgery  and  to  give  up  art.  But  art 
was  the  breath  of  life  to  him. 

His  sixty  pounds  were  long  since  exhausted ; 
he  kept  himself  by  selling  copies  of  the  old 
masters  to  the  dealers.  He  entered  so  entirely 
into  the  feeling  of  the  original  pictures  that 
when  in  later  days  he  exhibited  some  of  his 
copies  at  the  Royal  Academy  many  people 
insisted  they  could  not  be  his,  but  must  have 
been  old  pictures  which  he  had  purchased  on 
the  spot. 

In  1839  Stevens  was  at  Milan  studying  orna- 
ment under  Albertolli,  and  in  spare  moments 
measuring  the  fronts  of  the  palaces.  •  He  returned 
to  Rome  in  1840,  where,  to  gain  a  living,  he 
became  clerk  of  works  to  a  builder,  in  which 
position  he  was  most  unpopular,  owing  to  the 
amount  of  work  he  exacted  from  the  men.  After 
this,   he   became  acquainted   with    Thorwaldsen, 


216  FROM   THE   POUCH 

the  sculptor,  of  whom  Mr.  Stannus  tells  us  he 
often  spoke  with  gratitude,  and  declared  that  he 
was  the  only  man  to  whom  he  owed  any  pupilage. 

In  1842,  after  fourteen  years  of  unceasing 
study,  Stevens  at  last  returned  to  England, 
perhaps  the  most  thoroughly  educated  artist  the 
country  has  ever  seen.  He  had  never  worked 
in  any  English  school ;  his  entire  training  was 
acquired  in  Italy.  Then  he  went  back  to  his 
home  in  Dorsetshire,  where  he  remained  for  a 
year  or  two,  unappreciated  and  misunderstood — 
not  an  uncommon  experience. 

The  following  little  story,  which  Mr.  Stannus 
quotes  as  being  typical  of  Stevens,  should  belong 
to  this  time.  A  musical  friend  of  his  was  trying 
to  make  an  ophicleide  for  use  in  an  amateur 
band,  and  having  finished  the  straight  pipe, 
could  get  no  further.  Stevens  thereupon  came 
to  the  rescue,  cut  out  the  shapes  of  the  brass 
sheets  in  brown  paper,  and  these  plates  when 
bent  and  hammered  up  served  perfectly  for  the 
desired  purpose.  This  feat  became  the  talk  of 
the  town,  and  Stevens  was  spoken  of  "as  the 
young  man  who  could  not  only  paint  pictures 
that  were  of  no  use  to  any  one,  but  could  also 


ALFRED   STEVENS  217 

make    brass     instruments     which      could     play 
music." 

In  1845,  when  he  was  twenty-seven  years  of 
age,  he  was  appointed  to  a  post  in  the  Govern- 
ment School  of  Design,  and  he  writes  to  a 
friend:  "I  was  sent  for  the  other  day  to  Somer- 
set House  and  offered  a  place  in  the  School  of 
Design  as  Professor  of  everything.  The  place 
is  one  which  will  at  once  put  me  in  such  an 
excellent  position,  and  is  so  well  fitted  for  me, 
that  I  expect  to  gain  much  credit  by  it.  I  don't 
think  I  can  expect  too  much  from  it.  The  salary 
will  make  me  quite  independent.  It  interferes 
scarcely  at  all  with  my  time.  ...  I  got  this 
place  without  any  sort  of  interest,  and  without 
solicitation  on  my  own  part." 

We  read  that  Stevens  made  himself  generally 
beloved  and  appreciated;  his  pupils  were  delighted 
with  him.  He  had  a  quick,  piercing  eye,  a  most 
winning  smile,  and  the  sweetness  of  his  voice 
and  manner  had  great  influence  over  them  all. 
Stannus  tells  us  that  the  young  master's  powerful, 
dexterous  brush-work  created  a  sensation  among 
the  students. 

There  is  a  little  story  of  how  Richard  Beavis, 


218  FROM   THE  PORCH 

afterwards  very  well  known,  who  was  working 
under  him,  said  on  one  occasion,  '*  I  sketched  in 
the  ornaments,  sir."  To  which  Stevens  replied, 
"  We  don't  sketch  here,  we  draw."  Ellis  and 
Townroe,  two  of  his  pupils  at  this  time,  after- 
wards worked  under  him  for  the  Wellington 
Memorial. 

But  after  two  years  only  Stevens  resigned  his 
appointment,  "disgusted,"  he  said  in  after  days, 
"by  the  meddlesome  supervision  of  ignorant 
Government  clerks."  Thus  the  school,  losing  his 
inspiration  and  decorative  teaching,  fell  back 
into  the  Slough  of  Despond,  until  1860,  when 
Stevens's  good  influence  revived  through  the 
teaching  of  his  pupils,  Sykes  and  others,  who 
were  masters  at  South  Kensington  under  the 
enterprising  management  of  Sir  Henry  Cole. 

All  this  time  Stevens  had  been  doing  a  great 
deal  of  book  illustration,  drawing  pictures  for 
the  Bible,  for  Shakespeare,  and  Homer.  He 
also  sent  in  designs  for  Macaulay's  Lays  of 
Ancient  Rome,  but  Macaulay  preferred  the  style 
of  Scharf.  Whatever  Stevens  took  in  hand  he 
seemed  to  illuminate  with  his  gift.  There  is  no 
end    to   the    things   which  he  achieved.     Deys- 


ALFRED   STEVENS  219 

brook,  a  manor  near  Liverpool,  belonging  to 
the  Blundell  family,  was  entirely  decorated  by 
him.  The  lovely  drawings  for  the  work  are  to 
be  seen  in  the  South  Kensington  Museum.  He 
also  took  in  hand  a  house  in  Palace  Gardens, 
belonging  to  the  Murietta  family.  He  was  so 
rapid  a  worker  that  only  a  fortnight  was  required 
for  the  Deysbrook  drawings,  and  we  are  told 
that  Stevens  executed  them  without  a  model. 
It  is  almost  bewildering  to  follow  the  many 
impressions  of  his  mind.  Among  other  things, 
military  uniforms  occupied  his  attention  ;  then 
came  a  design  for  a  royal  railway  carriage,  like  a 
fairy  chariot,  for  the  King  of  Denmark.  The 
King  was  so  pleased  that  he  begged  the  artist 
to  come  and  settle  in  Denmark,  but  this  offer 
Stevens  refused. 

In  1848  the  improvement  of  the  Nelson  Column 
was  under  discussion,  and  Landseer's  lions  had 
not  then  been  thought  of  Stevens  entered  into 
the  scheme  ;  his  idea  was  to  give  some  refinement 
in  scale  to  the  pedestal,  by  the  addition  of  figures 
and  ornaments  in  bronze  upon  the  hollow  mould- 
ing. The  original  beautiful  plaster  sketch  of  the 
proposed  addition  is  to  be  seen  at  South  Kensing- 


220  FROM   THE   PORCH 

ton.  In  1850  every  British  and  Irish  manufac- 
turer of  any  note  was  straining  his  utmost  to 
prepare  a  worthy  show  in  the  great  Exhibition 
which  was  to  be  held  in  the  following  year. 
Stevens,  who  had  been  engaged  as  manager  by 
Messrs.  Hoole  &  Co.,  seconded  by  his  assistants, 
Godfrey  Sykes  and  Townroe,  produced  a  number 
of  suggestions  for  homely  use,  such  as  hot-air 
stoves,  &c.  The  firm  carried  away  every  medal 
in  1851,  and  outdistanced  all  competition.  It 
is  no  exaggeration  to  say  that  his  work  caused 
a  new  development  in  bronze  and  iron.  Stevens, 
without  previous  training,  appears  to  have 
mastered  the  technical  requirements  from  the 
first,  while  the  aesthetic  instinct  tau2:ht  him  to 
design  every  adornment  of  the  right  kind  in 
its  right  place.  Before  his  time,  our  bronze 
and  iron  manufacturers  had  chiefly  depended 
on  rococo  ornaments  produced  by  second-rate 
foreigners. 

On  Saturday,  September  13,  1856,  the  news- 
papers advertised  for  designs  for  the  Wellington 
Memorial.  A  friend  of  Stevens  hurried  off  to 
him  with  the  information.  By  Monday  morning 
he  decided  to  compete.     He  was  living  at  that 


ALFRED   STEVENS  221 

time  at  7  Canning  Place,  Kensington,  and  in 
the  little  back  room  he  made  the  model  for  the 
monument,  while  the  front  room  was  occupied 
with  his  office  drawings.  The  proposed  position 
of  the  Wellington  Monument,  so  we  are  told, 
fired  his  imagination.  It  is  only  now,  thanks 
to  Lord  Leighton's  efforts,  which  have  been  con- 
tinued to  this  day  by  those  ^vho  have  eyes  to 
see  and  influence  to  enforce,  that  the  monument 
is  to  be  seen  where  it  was  meant  to  be  ;  and 
will  be  admired,  noble  and  complete  at  last,  and 
as  Stevens  saw  it  in  his  mind. 

His  fastidiousness  in  not  parting  with  any 
work  until  the  last  moment  nearly  caused  the 
miscarriage  of  the  Wellington  Memorial.  The 
last  day  for  sending  it  in  was  Whit  Monday, 
and  his  friend  Ellis  spent  the  whole  day  seeking 
high  and  low  for  a  cart  to  convey  the  model 
to  Westminster  Hall.  At  last,  in  the  evening, 
he  found  a  pleasure-van  returning  from  Hamp- 
stead  Heath,  and  into  this  the  model  was  hoisted, 
and  after  the  horses  had  rested  the  van  started 
once  more.  Ellis  accompanied  it,  and  arrived 
at  Westminster  three  minutes  before  midnight. 
After    much  persuasion,   he   got    some  workmen 


222  FROM  THE   PORCH 

to  help  him  carry  it  into  the  Hall,  where  it 
arrived  just  as  the  clock  struck  twelve. 

Stevens's  name  came  out  only  sixth  in  the  list 
of  competitors,  but  when  the  designs  were  tried 
under  the  model  of  the  arch  in  St.  Paul's,  where 
they  were  to  stand,  his  was  found  to  be  the  only 
one  suitable. 

After  this  great  effort  he  went  to  Italy  once 
more  to  refresh  his  mind.  He  examined  many 
monuments  and  churches  there,  and  it  is  said 
on  his  return  that,  on  going  into  his  study  and 
looking  at  his  own  design,  he  said,  "  Not  so  bad, 
after  all." 

The  Catalogue  of  the  National  Gallery  of 
British  Art  tells  the  story  of  the  fortune  be- 
queathed to  him  by  a  friend,  an  American,  who 
admired  his  genius  so  much  that  he  left  him  all 
he  had ;  but  when  Stevens  found  there  were 
relations  who  had  counted  on  the  money,  he 
gave  it  back  to  them,  only  keeping  two  folios  in 
which  his  friend  had  written  his  name.  He  had 
few  companions.  He  shunned  society ;  he  lived 
for  his  work.  I  have  been  told  of  people  trying 
in  vain  to  make  his  acquaintance  in  the  studio 
at  Hampstead  where  he  lived,  and  absolutely 
refused  anyone  admittance  to  his  house. 


ALFRED   STEVENS  223 

Meanwhile  the  great  monument,  his  utterance 
to  the  world,  the  noble  tribute  to  the  mighty  war- 
rior, was  raised  with  its  emblems,  in  its  strength 
and  beauty,  its  delicate  and  exquisite  detail. 

But  there  was  still  much  to  endure  for  a  man 
of  Stevens's  sensitive  nature.  He  was  harassed 
by  critics,  hampered  by  the  delay  of  payment 
to  enable  him  to  complete  his  work.  In  1875 
he  wrote  to  Mr.  Pegler,  a  lifelong  friend,  a  letter 
which  is  a  reply  to  some  of  those  who  had  so 
greatly  harassed  him.  In  less  than  twelve  hours 
after  writing  the  letter  he  died  quite  suddenly.  . .  . 

We  are  told  that  absence  of  material  prevented 
any  official  memoir  being  written.  But  a  richly 
illustrated  and  interesting  folio  volume  was  pub- 
lished in  1891  by  the  Autotype  Company,  in 
which  the  bare  facts  of  the  painter's  life  are  to 
be  found,  with  notes  by  his  faithful  pupil,  Hugh 
Stannus.  Stevens  was  neither  given  to  letter- 
writing,  nor  to  keeping  a  diary.  It  is  in  the 
mass  of  drawings  and  scribblings,  and  in  the 
manifold  studies  he  left,  that  his  history  is  told. 
We  see  thought  upon  thought,  impression  upon 
impression,  dawning  from  the  first  incoherence 
into  completeness.     Stevens  cared  for  the  beauti- 


224  FROM   THE   PORCH 

ful,  he  scorned  the  material  machinery  of  success 
and  advancement ;  what  he  loved  was  Art ;  he 
worshipped  at  the  shrine  of  beauty  and  power. 
With  St.  Peter,  he  could  say,  "  Silver  and  gold 
have  I  none,  but  such  as  I  have,  give  I  thee." 

A.  R.  AND  H.  R. 


REMINISCENCES 


CONCERNING   THE   FOUNDING   OF 
THE   "CORNHILL   MAGAZINE  " 

What  we  call,  and  what  our  children  in  turn 
will  call,  old  days,  are  the  days  of  our  early  youth, 
and  to  the  writer  the  old  days  of  the  Corn/nil 
Magazine  convey  an  impression  of  early  youth, 
of  constant  sunshine  mysteriously  associated  with 
the  dawn  of  the  golden  covers,  even  though  it 
was  in  winter  that  they  first  appeared. 

Recalling  those  vivid  times,  she  cannot  but 
think  instinctively  of  the  friends  who  also  lived 
then,  of  her  father  and  her  home  as  it  was  then, 
of  George  Smith,  the  founder  of  the  Cornhill, 
of  his  far-reaching  life  of  generous  achievement, 
of  the  companion  of  that  life  whose  voice  never 
unheeded,  whose  influence  always  counting  for 
so  much,  was  that  of  the  tender  wife  and 
helpmate,  to  whom  he  ever  turned,  and  his 
children  with  him. 

Not  many  words  are  needed  to  speak  of 
the  jubilee   of  the  Cornhill    in   1910.      There  is 


228  FROM   THE   PORCH 

nothing  new  to  say,  except  that  which  happily 
is  not  new,  and  continues  still  to  belong  to  its 
traditions ;  no  less  than  in  the  days  when  its 
founder,  the  builder  of  so  many  great  enter- 
prises, first  spoke  of  it  to  the  first  editor. 
Through  the  years  which  have  followed,  and 
when  among  others  Leslie  Stephen  was  editor 
in  turn,  that  good  tradition  has  not  changed. 

"  Our  magazine  is  written  not  only  for  men 
and  women,  but  for  boys,  girls,  infants,"  my 
father  says. 

And  to  add  to  this  there  is  what  each  of  us 
may  remember  for  ourselves.  What  philosophies, 
what  fine  utterances  have  rung  from  the  familiar 
shrine,  and  what  honoured  voices  have  echoed 
thence ! 

I  am  told  that  my  father  demurred  at  first 
to  the  suggestion  of  editing  the  Cornhill.  Such 
work  did  not  lie  within  his  scope,  but  then  Mr 
George  Smith  arranged  that  he  himself  was  to 
undertake  all  business  transactions,  and  my 
father  was  only  to  go  on  writing  and  criticising 
and  suggesting  ;  and  so  the  first  start  of  the 
Cornhill  was  all  gaily  settled  and  planned.  The 
early  records  of  the  start  still  to  be  read  of  in 


THE   "COKNHILL  MAGAZINE"      229 

the  old  diaries,  are  of  a  cheerful  character — 
no  time  is  lost — business  questions  are  adjourned 
to  Greenwich,  to  dinners  there,  to  gardens — 
friendly  meetings  abound.  .  .  , 

I  have  an  impression  also,  besides  the  play, 
of  very  hard  and  continuous  work  during  all 
that  time ;  of  a  stream  of  notes  and  messengers 
from  Messrs.  Smith  &  Elder ;  of  consultations, 
calculations.  I  find  an  old  record  which  states 
that  "in  sixteen  days"  the  Cornhill  was  planned 
and  equipped  for  its  long  journey. 

My  father  would  go  to  Wimbledon,  where  the 
young  couple  Mr.  and  Mrs.  George  Smith  were 
then  living.  Later  on  it  was  Mr.  Smith  who 
used  to  come  and  see  my  father,  in  Onslow 
Square,  driving  in  early,  morning  after  morning, 
on  his  way  to  business,  carrying  a  certain  black 
bag  full  of  papers  and  correspondence,  and 
generally  arriving  about  breakfast-time. 

On  September  1,  1859,  the  following  entry 
occurs  in  Mr.  George  Smith's  diary  : 

**  Went  to  dine  at  Greenwich  with  Thackeray 
to  talk  about  magazine ^ 

On  January  1,  18 GO  (only  four  months  later), 
the  first  number  of  the  Cornhill  was  published. 


230  FKOM   THE   POUCH 

We  read,  on  January  3,  1860:  ''Called  on 
Thackeray  on  my  way  to  the  City ;  signed  agree- 
ment 7xspecting  *  Roundabout  Papers.'  Mr. 
Thackeray  in  very  good  spirits  at  the  success 
of  the  Cornhill. 

"January  27,  1860. — No.  2  published. — ordered 
80,000  to  be  p)'i''inted.  Called  in  Bride  Lane  to 
see  how  they  ivere  .selling  the  second  number  of  the 
magazine.     The  demand  very  rapid. 

"January  30,  I860.  — Ordered  100,000  to  be 
printed  of  Cornhill  Magazine. 

"May  31,  1860.-^0  Thackeray  with  first 
volume  of  magazine." 

Mr.  George  Smith  has  himself  told  us  of  how 
the  first  idea  of  the  magazine  came  to  him.  He 
says: 

"  The  plan  flashed  upon  me  suddenly,  as  did 
most  of  the  ideas  which  have  in  the  course  of 
my  life  led  to  successful  operations.  The  existing 
magazines  were  few,  and  when  not  high-priced 
were  narrow  in  literary  range ;  and  it  seemed  to 
me  that  a  shilling  magazine  which  contained, 
in  addition  to  other  first-class  literary  matter, 
a  serial  novel  by  Thackeray,  must  command  a 
large  sale.     Thackeray's  name  was  one  to  conjure 


THE   "CORNHILL   MAGAZINE"      231 

with,  and  according  to  the  plan,  as  it  shaped 
itself  in  my  mind,  the  pubUc  would  have  a  serial 
novel  by  Thackeray,  and  a  good  deal  else  worth 
reading,  for  the  price  they  had  been  accustomed 
to  pay  for  the  monthly  number  of  his  novels 
alone." 

We  know  how  successfully  "  the  plan  "  worked, 
what  a  remarkable  and  willing  army  of  helpers 
joined  the  enterprise. 

Anthony  Trollope,  a  stately  herald,  opened  the 
first  number  of  the  Cornhill  with  his  delight- 
ful history  of  Framley  Parsonage ;  my  father 
wound  up  with  the  "Roundabout  Paper"  called 
*'  On  a  Lazy  Idle  Boy,"  and  he  describes  the 
magazine  while  addressing  the  young  reader : 

"  Our  Cornhill  Magazine  owners  strive  to 
provide  thee  with  facts  as  well  as  fiction,"  he 
says,  "  and  though  it  does  not  become  them 
to  brag  of  their  ordinary,  at  least  they  invite 
thee  to  a  table  where  thou  shalt  sit  in  good 
company." 

Further  on  he  writes  concerning  his  own 
story,  Lovel  the  Widoivcr  and  Framley  Parson- 
age, as  of  "  Two  novels  under  two  flags ;  the 
one  that  ancient  ensign  which  has  hung  before 


232  FROM   THE   PORCH 

the  well-known  booth  of  '  Vanity  Fair,'  the  other 
that  fresh  and  handsome  standard  which  has 
lately  been  hoisted  on  '  Barchester  Towers.'" 

Father  Front's  beautiful  inaugurative  ode 
appeared  in  the  first  number.  It  is  addressed 
to  the  author  of  Vanity  Fair: 

"  There's  corn  in  Egypt  still 
(Pilgrim  from  Cairo  to  Cornhill !) 

Give  each  his  fill ; 

But  all  comers  among 

Treat  best  the  young  ; 
Fill  the  big  brothers'  knapsacks  from  thy  bins, 
But  slip  the  Cup  of  Love  in  Benjamin's.  .  .  ." 

And  the  poem  concludes  with  a  grace  almost 
sung  to  music : 

"  Courage,  old  Friend  !  long  found 
Firm  at  thy  task,  not  in  fixt  purpose  fickle : 
Up  !  choose  thy  ground, 
Put  forth  thy  shining  sickle  : 
Shun  the  dense  underwood 
Of  Dunce  or  Dundei-hood  : 
But  reap  North,  South,  East,  Far  West, 
The  world-wide  Harvest !  " 

The  poet  of  the  past  sang  of  the  may  he,  fifty 
years  later ;  Thomas  Hardy,  the  poet  of  to-day, 
has  also  sung  in  lines  well  worthy,  of  the  might 
have   been;    but   the   two   songs   do   not   clash. 


THE    ^'COENHILL   MAGAZINE"      233 

The  many  harvests  have  ripened  in  turn.  "  The 
High  Crusades  to  lessen  tears"  are  following 
on  the  harvests ;  and  true  teachers,  wise,  hope- 
ful, and  sincere,  still  hold  their  own  among  the 
brawling  empirics  of  the  hour. 

Many  of  the  growing  convictions  of  to-day 
were  first  pre-echoed  in  those  bygone  pages.  I 
remember,  long  after  my  father's  death,  hearing 
Leslie  Stephen,  who  was  then  editor,  speaking 
with  admiring  warmth  of  some  of  Ruskin's  later 
writings.  But  when  the  series  first  appeared 
in  the  Cornhill,  so  great  an  outcry  was  raised, 
that  the  papers  had  to  be  stopped. 

The  names  are  recorded  of  those  who  used  to 
meet  at  the  Cornhill  dinners  month  after  month 
— honoured,  familiar  names  of  people  who  were 
then  at  work,  writing  papers  still  read,  designing 
pictures  which  are  not  forgotten.  When  the 
time  came  for  my  father  to  leave  the  editorial 
chair,  these  meetings  went  on,  and  he  still  joined 
the  good  company,  only  he  felt  a  great  relief 
from  the  straining  and  recurrent  cares  of  editor- 
ship. It  was  in  March  1862  he  wrote  to  Mr. 
Smith  resigning  his  post. 

"  No  one  can   doubt   that  he  came  to  a  wise 


234  FROM   THE   PORCH 

decision,"  writes  Mr.  George  Smith,  and  he  goes 
on :  "I  like  to  think  that  the  tender  heart 
of  this  noble  man  of  genius  was  not  troubled 
by  editorial  thorns  during  the  remainder  of 
his  life." 

His  life  did  not  last  very  long.  At  my  father's 
death  in  1863  my  sister  and  I  were  in  troubled  per- 
plexity about  his  various  copyrights,  which  were  all 
in  various  hands  and  unmanageable  for  us,  and 
quite  unrealisable.  Things  seemed  at  a  dead- 
lock, when  our  good  friend  came  forward  with 
a  liberal  and  timely  offer  beyond  anything  my 
father  had  told  us  the  copyrights  were  worth. 
It  was  then  that  Messrs.  Smith  &  Elder  bought 
up  the  various  rights  and  administered  the 
whole,  with  results  which  were  eventually  to 
benefit  all  concerned.  I  like  to  quote  the 
words  written  by  Leslie  Stephen,  my  brother- 
in-law,  which  seem  to  me  to  give  so  vivid  an 
aspect  of  the  founder  of  the  Cornhill,  and  of 
the  Dictionary  of  National  Biography ;  "  A  good 
commander  must,  I  take  it,  be  in  the  first  place, 
a  good  man  of  business,  and,  conversely,  Smith's 
faculty  for  business  would  have  gone  a  long  way 
to  the  making  of  a  leader  in  war.   ...   A  man,  as 


THE    "COPvNHILL   MAGAZINE"      235 

Johnson  wisely  remarks,  can  seldom  be  em})loyed 
more  innocently  than  in  making  money,  and 
Smith  as  a  man  of  business  miorht  claim  the 
benefit  of  that  dictum.  But  he  would  not  have 
had  positive  claims  upon  public  gratitude  if 
he  had  not  combined  this  with  loftier  aims.  .  .  . 
It  was  a  pleasure  to  work  with  a  man  so  much 
above  petty  considerations,  and  so  appreciative 
(sometimes,  perhaps,  beyond  their  merits)  of  men 
whose  abilities  lay  in  a  less  practical  direction. 
Smith  had  the  true  chivalrous  spirit  which 
makes  thorough  co-operation  possible.  Thackeray 
would  have  been  gratified,  but  not  surprised, 
could  it  have  been  revealed  to  him  that  after 
his  death  his  daughters  would  find  his  old  ally 
the  most  helpful  and  affectionate  of  friends  and 
advisers." 

Now  that  the  Cornhill  has  more  than  fulfilled 
its  vigorous  fiftieth  year,  it  is  impossible  for 
those  nearly  connected  with  it  not  to  look 
back  with  pride  at  its  faithful  career.  Reading 
in  the  memoir  by  Sir  Sidney  Lee,  in  that  "  in 
memoriam  "  from  which  I  have  quoted,  and  still 
more  in  the  remembrance  of  life's  experience, 
the  words  of  the  Psalmist  recur  to  my  mind — 


236  FROM   THE  PORCH 

"  Using  no  deceit  in  his  tongue,  nor  doing  evil 
"  to  his  neighbour,  swearing  to  his  neighbour  and 
**  disappointing  him  not,  though  it  were  to  his 
"  own  hindrance."  They  seem  most  fitly  to  speak 
of  such  a  generous  and  abiding  history. 


A   MEETING   IN    A   GARDEN 

MAY-TIME    1903 

The  fulloioing  little  paper  owes  its  chief  interest  fo  the  fact 
that  the  Good  Samaritans  therein  mentioned  were  Canon  Barnetf 
and  his  icife  journeying  through  Surrey,  driving  in  a  little 
carriage,  and  calling  by  chance  at  the  Hurst  on  HamUedcm 
Oreen,  where  we  ictre  staying  in  the  absence  of  the  hostesses 
themselves.  This  ivas  written  in  May  1903,  ten  years  ago,  and 
we  can  realise  what  the  humane  impulse  and  practical  leader- 
ship of  these  Samaritans  has  brought  about  since  then.  It  is 
good  to  recall  even  an  hour  spent  in  such  company. 

Canon  Barnetf s  death  is  one  of  those  that  must  affect  all 
loho  have  realised,  what  his  generous  life  was;  its  meaning  to 
those  who  lived  round  about  him.,  to  others  who  turned  to  him 
with  natural  impulse,  not  personally,  but  with  instinctive  trust 
and  admiration.  No  one  could  ever  speak  as  Mrs.  Barnett 
has  spoken  in  the  noble  words  she  has  quoted  concerning  her 
husband.  One  of  these  texts  seems  written  for  him.  "  There 
is  a  vision  in  the  heart  of  each,  of  justice,  mercy,  wisdom, 
tenderness  to  wrong  and  pain,  and  knowledge  of  its  cure.^' 

Some  one  has  told,  me  of  Canon  Barnett  at  Darjeeling,  reading 

out  Abt  Vogler  to  his  wife  and  his  fnends  as  he  rested  there. 

Others  of  us  who  may  not  have  heard  him  read,  have  listened 

to  his  fine  voice  in  the  AJ)bey ;  it  still  seems  speaking,  in  his 

influence,  and  his  beliefs,  and  his  teaching.     In  the  great  Abbey 

itself,  as  in  the  cloister  without,  or  in   Whiterhapel,  where  the 

struggle  is  so  hard,  or  again,  in  the  northern  suburbs,  where  a 

lesson  has  been  taught  and  an  example  of  happiness  has  been  set 

237 


238  FROM  THE  POECH 

by  him  and  Ms  wife,  which  tvill  not  cease  lohile  men  suffer,  while 
poets  utter,  while  generous  lives  are  given  to  truth. 

For  the  last  three  or  four  days,  looking  across 
the  village  green  where  many  white  geese  are 
disporting  themselves,  in  the  company  of  cows 
tranquilly  browsing,  we  have  watched  Black- 
down  and  Hindhead,  sometimes  splendid  in  blue 
and  purple,  sometimes  wound  in  silver  mist. 
Every  hour  has  held  its  own  delight.  The  very 
first  morning  after  we  came  the  cuckoo  began  at 
four  o'clock  calling  to  sluggards  to  arise,  to  look 
out  at  the  sight  of  the  mountain-tops  beneath  the 
morning's  sovereign  eye,  at  the  wide  valley  with 
its  kindling  lights,  at  the  whole  space  of  nature 
rejoicing  and  vibrating  in  the  early  dawn,  with 
flights  of  birds  and  with  songs  of  triumph.  The 
house  we  are  staying  in  is  full  of  delightful 
things,  and  charming  possessions  of  books  and 
pictures,  but  as  yet  we  have  not  looked  or 
thought  of  any  of  them.  This  burst  of  summer 
has  been  the  one  predominant  fact  in  our  minds, 
and  the  refrain  of  every  thrush  and  blackbird, 
the  meaning  of  every  leaf  and  shining  blade 
seems  to  be  an  entreaty  to  beneficent  human 
beings  to  render  grace   for   all    this    space  and 


A   MEETING   IN   A   GARDEN         239 

melody,  and  to  prize  it  for  our  own  joy  and  for 
that  of  others. 

While  I  still  lived  in  London — was  it  a  year 
or  a  week  ago — I  looked  at  the  papers  and  read 
with  an  Englishwoman's  complacency  of  vast 
sums  bestowed  in  every  direction  on  "  improve- 
ments," decorations,  demolitions ;  I  read  of  sales 
by  auction,  of  pictures  fetching  unimaginable 
record-prices,  of  first  editions  going  for  hundreds, 
china  pots  for  thousands ;  I  read  of  magnificent 
doings  and  banquets,  of  libraries  scattered  all 
over  the  country  by  benevolent  millionaires. 
But  while  I  read  of  all  these  excellent  things  I 
did  not  read  of  provisions  by  magnificent  donors 
of  air  and  light,  and  space  and  peace  for  those 
who  are  in  want  of  them  ;  nor  did  I  read  of 
munificent  thousands  flowing  in  for  the  protec- 
tion of  the  beauty  of  the  open  spaces  which  are 
with  us  still.  Here  and  there  a  park  is  opened 
(and  blessed  be  the  givers  thereof),  an  acre  or 
two  is  saved,  with  much  trouble  and  appealing 
print,  from  the  brick-bats,  a  disused  graveyard  is 
arranged  with  tasteful  iron  seats  for  the  use  of 
the  living.  We  are  like  the  king  in  the  fairy 
tale,  we  seem  more  inclined  to  give  our  willing 


240  FROM   THE   PORCH 

largesses  to  the  artificial  nightingales  than  to 
the  real  ones.  These  latter  literally,  alas,  go  to 
the  wall.  Groves  are  cut  down,  singing  birds  are 
silenced,  the  devouring  monster  of  greed  and  con- 
fusion and  disorganisation  steadily  demands  his 
tribute  year  after  year.  He  is  not  of  the  sea, 
but  of  the  slum ;  and  knight  after  knight,  child 
after  child,  maiden  after  maiden  fall  beneath  his 
grasping  clutch  and  poisonous  breath.  Is  he  not 
even  now  crawling  up  along  the  beautiful  old 
gardens  of  Chelsea,  doomed  one  by  one  to  be 
sacrificed.  Even  the  Paradise  of  Dante  was 
arranged  with  regard  to  open  spaces  and  in 
circles,  but  in  the  comparatively  limited  areas  at 
our  disposal,  all  seems  to  be  left  to  chance,  to 
the  luck  of  the  moment,  to  the  fancy  of  the 
owner. 

And  this  is  the  gist  of  what  I  write,  amid  that 
wonder  of  beauty  which  is  in  the  world,  and 
which  comes  home  again  and  again  to  so  many  of 
us  as  soon  as  we  have  a  little  time  to  breathe 
and  to  admire.  A  friend  to  whom  I  exclaimed 
yesterday  as  we  stood  together  in  the  garden 
listening  to  the  choirs  overhead,  sympathised 
both   with   my  pleasure  and  my  complaint  that 


A   MEETING   IN   A   GARDEN       241 

all  this  silence  and  inspiration  had  its  price, 
could  be  bought  and  sold;  and  that  even  here, 
in  this  peaceful  land,  bricks  and  villas  are  not 
unknown. 

My  companion,  standing  among  these  borders 
of  iris  and  fragrant  pink  and  delicate  campion, 
handed  me  not  a  flower  but  a  (metaphorical) 
nettle  to  grasp.  "  Of  course,"  he  said,  "  every 
owner  of  land  very  naturally  objects,  just  as 
you  do,  to  seeing  villas  and  small  workmen's 
houses  rising  against  his  horizons,  and  every 
builder  is  only  too  glad  to  secure  open  spaces 
at  other  people's  expense ;  meanwhile  people 
must  have  houses  to  live  in,  population  increases, 
and  we  are  not  yet  quite  prepared  to  follow 
Herod's  example.  .  .  ."  Grasping  my  nettle, 
it  occurs  to  me  that  to  this,  one  might  reply 
that  beauty  is  an  indefinable  thing,  which  de- 
pends on  proportion,  on  suitability,  on  good  work- 
manship (Nature  we  know  gives  us  the  best 
workmanship  possible  under  every  circumstance). 
Houses  must  come,  but  they  should  be  properly 
built  and  in  proper  places,  and  what  we  want 
in  our  growing  towns  and  villages  and  country 

places  is  not  stagnation,  nor  highly  advantageous 

Q 


242  FROM  THE  PORCH 

building  speculations,  but  a  liberal  economy  in 
the  distribution  of  habitation  and  space  and  air, 
the  same  care  and  art  as  that  which  is  given,  for 
instance,  to  shipbuilding  or  to  machinery,  to 
ensure  the  most  effectual  results  with  the  least 
waste  of  space  and  expense ;  we  do  not  want 
a  whole  country  side  spoilt  by  a  couple  of  stray 
red  villas  set  up  where  some  builder  can  make 
most  by  them.  Why  should  not  this  art  of 
proportionate  distribution,  for  which  I  know  no 
name,  be  applied  to  the  necessities  of  daily  life  ? 
Why  are  there  no  Supreme  Courts  for  home- 
beauty  and  comfort,  and  economy  of  ugliness, 
as  well  as  Treasuries  and  Foreign  Offices  ?  Why 
are  there  not  councils  for  the  ordaining  of  neces- 
sary amenities  as  well  as  for  the  suppression  of 
those  things  which  have  gone  hopelessly  wrong  ? 
I  know  there  are  many  societies,  each  wise  and 
delightful  in  intention,  but  chiefly  the  outcome 
of  private  feeling ;  what  we  need  is  a  Court 
with  wisdom  to  will  and  power  to  decide. 

A  Good  Samaritan  and  his  wife  came  here 
on  their  way  not  long  ago  and  stopped  for  an 
hour  to  rest  in  this  green  corner.  To  them 
(and    they   are   Gardeners,   indeed,  in    the    best 


A   MEETING   IN   A   GARDEN       243 

sense  of  the  term),  I  confess  I  owe  the  impulse 
which  now  urges  me  to  write  this.  "  I  find 
the  longer  I  live  the  more  I  care  for  open 
spaces,"  said  the  wife.  "  In  all  the  schemes 
which  are  daily  started  there  is  hardly  ever 
room  enough  allowed  for  space ;  for  birds  to 
fly,  for  winds  to  blow,  for  children  to  play." 
And  then  the  other  of  these  Good  Samaritans, 
who  had  been  tying  up  his  pony  in  a  neigh- 
bouring shed,  now  joining  into  our  talk,  said, 
"  At  this  very  minute,  I  know  of  a  beautiful 
green  place  with  trees  marked  for  building 
lots,  within  a  twopenny  fare  of  the  heart  of 
the  City.  It  could  be  bought  very  cheap.  Any 
very  rich  man  could  give  it  to  some  of  the 
thousand  poor  ones  who  are  choking  for  breath 
and  peace  and  who  might  come  up  in  the  Tube 
and  enjoy  themselves.  .  .  .  If  it  is  not  saved 
the  chance  of  an  open  space  easily  reached 
and  full  of  pleasure  and  profit  will  be  gone 
for  ever.  This  is  what  working  people  want 
even  more  than  books." 

And  this  is  what  working  people  owe  to  Canon 
and  Mrs.  Barnett. 


UPSTAIRS   AND   DOWNSTAIRS 

I 

Each  generation  is  a  natural  postscript  to  that 
which  has  gone  before,  just  as  one's  own  succeed- 
ing decades  take  different  views,  while  the  story 
of  life  tells  on.  The  stairs  still  lead  from  the 
parlour  to  the  kitchen,  the  maidens  still  cook, 
scrub  and  tidy  up,  and  break  the  china,  and 
wring  the  cloths,  and  sweep  away  the  litter  of 
each  succeeding  day.  The  present  superintend- 
ing genius  of  Mabys  still  builds  her  altars,  lights 
her  friendly  shrines ;  still  befriends  the  forlorn ; 
still  takes  girls  in  hand,  holds  them  up  when 
they  are  slipping,  starts  them  in  life  over  and 
over  again,  nurses  them  in  illness,  makes 
pleasures  for  them  along  the  way.  Mabys  was 
a  young  and  immature  personage  when  the 
writer  first  made  her  acquaintance  ;  she  is  now 
an  experienced  ancient  dame  with  a  most 
enormous  family  to  provide  for— those  5851  little 
orphans  who  depend  upon  her  so  greatly. 


UPSTAIRS   AND   DOWNSTATHS     245 

When  Mrs.  Senior  was  appointed  by  Mr. 
Stansfeld  inspector  of  workhouse  schools,  certain 
facts  became  painfully  apparent  to  her.  Two- 
thirds  of  the  girls  whose  careers  were  traced 
were  utter  failures,  and  she  consulted  with  one 
friend,  among  others,  who  gave  her  the  result 
of  the  experience  she  had  gained  in  Bristol. 
Many  registers  were  gone  into,  and  many  state- 
ments and  facts  collected.  (I  remember  seeing 
the  kind  women  absorbed  in  their  work  at  a  big 
table  covered  with  papers.)  Mabys  was  started 
on  the  model  of  the  Bristol  enterprise,  where  the 
scheme  had  been  worked  out  under  the  name 
of  the  Preventive  Mission.  This  had  been  the 
doing  of  four  ladies — Miss  Mary  Carpenter,  Miss 
Margaret  Elliot,  Miss  Frances  Power  Cobbe,  and 
Miss  Sarah  Stephen.  It  proved  successful,  and 
it  spread  all  over  London  and  was  copied  in 
many  other  places. 

Besides  the  central  ofhce  in  London,  there  are 
branch  offices  everywhere.  Each  of  these  offices 
means  a  committee  and  a  certain  proportion  of 
visitors  who  undertake  to  help  and  care  for  a 
number  of  little  girls  who  from  circumstances 
are  among    the    most    absolutely  friendless   and 


246  FROM   THE   PORCH 

helpless  members  of  society.  Their  fathers  have 
abandoned  them,  or  are  dead.  Their  mothers 
are  dead  or  mad  or  drunken.  They  have  no 
relations,  or,  worse  still,  only  bad  ones.  They 
have  been  kept  alive  by  the  State ;  but  the 
State  is  at  best  more  of  an  incubator  than  a 
parent,  and  this  association  has  tried  to  help 
the  children  with  some  heart,  and  pity  to  spare 
for  so  much  childish  misery. 

Mabys  may  be  long  past  her  youth,  as  I  have 
said,  but  she  is  full  of  spirit  and  energy  still. 
Her  votaries  are  to  be  counted  by  thousands. 
A  number  of  them  poured  into  the  great  Hall 
in  Pimlico  the  other  day,  where  the  cakes  and 
the  tables  and  stacks  of  bread  and  butter  were 
sorted  out,  and  girls  of  every  shape  and  size 
were  assembling  round  huge  tea-pots  in  a 
pleasant  camaraderie.  As  each  couple  and 
triplet  of  girls  entered  the  hall  a  ministering 
lady  with  a  pencil  and  paper  met  them  and 
pointed  out  their  seats.  Some  young  servants 
looked  trim,  some  looked  smart,  others  dazed, 
others  were  delightful,  with  charming  faces  and 
merry  spirits.  Of  these  many  had  attended 
year  after  year.     I  was  shown  the  doyennes  of 


UPSTAIRS  AND   DOWNSTAIRS    247 

this  guild,  the  experienced  who,  being  over 
twenty  years  of  age,  are  no  longer  eligible  to 
belong  to  it,  but  who  are  associated  in  the  work 
as  "  Mabys  helpers,"  and  deputed  in  turn  to  visit 
and  advise  younger  and  less  capable  novices  in 
their  various  kitchens  and  pantries.  After  the 
feast  came  music  and  some  pretty  plays,  and 
then,  as  happens  to  us  all  in  turn,  the  guests 
had  to  go  back  to  their  work  once  more  and  take 
off  their  smart  hats  and  ribbons,  and  tie  on  their 
aprons  and  their  little  starched  caps. 

These  young  guests  mainly  come  from  the 
district  schools,  though  a  certain  number  have 
struggling  homes  of  their  own,  from  which  they 
apply  to  Mabys  for  assistance.  Some  are  found- 
lings, others  are  orphans,  some  have  not  even 
this  small  privilege.  In  explanation  of  this 
cynical  sentence,  let  me  quote  from  a  card  lately 
received  from  one  of  the  maidens,  to  whom  the 
secretary  wrote  asking  for  her  mother's  or  her 
sister's  address.  The  card,  duly  dated  and 
labelled,  "From  Ellen  C.  re  Alice  C,  April  '06, 
B.  VI.,"  arrived  at  the  central  office,  and  goes 
to  the  point  at  once:  "Dear  Miss,— 1  am  very 
pleased  to  tell  you  I  don't  know  where  neither 


248  FEOM  THE  PORCH 

are,  if  I  did  know  I  would  tell  you,  but  if  we 
knew  where  we  both  were  I  am  afraid  I  should 
not  be  doing  as  I  am." 

Whether  Alice  was  ever  discovered,  and 
whether  Ellen  continued  to  prosper,  and  whether 
they  went  on  doing  as  they  did,  is  all  noted 
and  inscribed  in  the  admirably  kept  books  of 
the  society,  and  I  do  realise  what  it  must  have 
been  to  Ellen  ill  or  in  difficulties,  and  in  the 
absence  of  any  desirable  natural  protector,  to 
have  a  "Dear  Miss"  to  consult  with. 

II 

The  first  office  of  the  Association  ever  opened 
was  at  Chelsea.  It  is  a  friendly  little  place, 
which  takes  a  benevolent  interest  in  the  vari- 
ous domestic  fortunes  and  misfortunes  of  the 
neighbourhood.  If  you  go  there  of  a  Monday 
morning  you  may  find  a  room  full  of  customers 
of  various  sizes,  and  an  almost  providential  ad- 
justment of  difterent  requirements. 

"  Well,  you  see,"  a  stout  lady  was  saying 
confidentially,  "  I'm  so  much  alone  of  evenings, 
my  husband  being  out  with  the  carriage,  I 
want  a  girl  for  comp'ny  as    much  as  anything 


UPSTAIRS   AND   DOWNSTAIRS     249 

else.  I  don't  want  no  housework  from  her. 
I  want  her  to  do  any  little  odd  jobs  I  can't 
attend  to  myself,  and  to  mind  the  children. 
That  was   a  good  little    girl    enough   you    sent 

me,  Miss  Y ;  but  dear  me,  she  was  always 

a-crying  for  her  mother.  I  let  her  out  on 
Mondays,  and  Wednesdays,  and  Fridays ;  but 
she  wanted  to  go  home  at  night  as  well,  and 
now  she  says  she  won't  stay." 

"  It's  her  first  place,  ma'am,"  says  Miss  Y . 

"  They  are  apt  to  be  home-sick  at  first ;  but 
here  is  a  very  good  little  girl  who  has  no 
home,  poor  child.     Fanny,  my  dear,  should  you 

like    to   live  with  Mrs.  and    take   care    of 

her  nice  little  children?  You  might  like  to 
take  her  back  with  you  now  directly,  ma'am,  and 
show  her  the  place  and  the  dear  children  ? " 

Smiling  Fanny  steps  forward  briskly,  and  off 
they  go  together.  Then  a  pretty  young  lady, 
fashionably  dressed  in  a  fur  tippet,  begins : 

"  That  girl  was  no  good  at  all,  Miss  Y . 

Such  a  dance  as  she  led  me !  She  came  and 
gave  me  a  reference  miles  away,  and  ill  as  I 
was  I  dragged  myself  there ;  and  when  I  got 
to  the  house  she  herself  opened  the  door,  and 


250  FROM   THE  PORCH 

said  her  mistress  was  out  and  was  never  at 
home  at  all.  I  said  at  once,  '  You  don't  want 
to  come  to  us,  and  you  haven't  the  courage  to 
say  so,'  and  then  she  shut  the  door  in  my  face 
and  ran  away !  The  fact  is,  many  don't  like 
houses  with  apartments.  Our  first  floor  is 
vacant  at  present,  but  I  hope  it  will  soon  be 
let ;  and  I  should  be  so  glad  to  find  a  girl  who 
would-  come  at  once,  and  who  knows  something 
of  cookery,  though  my  mother  always  likes  to 
superintend  herself  in  the  kitchen." 

"  There  is  a  young  woman  here  who  says 
she  [can  cook,"  says  the  superintendent  doubt- 
fully, "but  there  seems  to  be  some  difficulty 
about  getting  her  character.  Do  you  think  we 
had  better  write  to  your  mistress  for  it,  my 
dear  ? " 

A  fierce,  wild  beast-looking  creature,  who  had 
been  glaring  in  a  corner,  here  in  answer  growls, 
"  I  don't  know,  I'm  sure." 

"  Why  did  you  leave  ?  "  says  the  young  lady. 

"  'Cos  she  had  such  a  wiolent  temper,"  says  the 
girl,  looking  more  and  more  ferocious. 

"  That  is  a  sad  thing  for  anybody  to  have," 
said  the  young  lady  gravely. 


UPSTAIRS   AND   DOWNSTAIRS     251 

At  this  moment  a  boy  puts  his  head  in  at 
the  door.     "Got  any  work  for  me?"  says  he. 

"  No,  no,"  cry  all  the  girls  together.  "  This 
isn't  for  boys ;  this  is  for  females,"  and  the 
head  disappears. 

"  Well,  and  what  do  you  want  ? "  says  the 
superintendent,  quite  bright  and  interested  with 
each  case  as  it  turns  up,  and  a  spruce  young 
person,  who  had  been  listening  attentively, 
steps  forward  and  says,  looking  hard  at  the 
young  lady  in  the  tippet : 

"  I  wish  for  a  place,  if  you  please,  ma'am, 
with  a  little  cooking  in  it,  where  the  lady 
herself  superingtends  in  the  kitchen — a  ladies' 
house  that  lets  apartments,  if  you  please ;  and 
I  shouldn't  wish  for  a  private  house,  only  an 
apartment  house."  At  which  the  young  mis- 
tress, much  pleased,  steps  forward,  and  a  private 
confabulation  immediately  begins. 

While  these  two  people  are  settling  their 
affairs  a  mysterious  person  in  a  veil  enters,  and 
asks  anxiously  in  a  sort  of  whisper,  "  Have 
you  heard  of  anything  f>r  me,  Miss?  You  see 
(emphatically)  it  is  something  so  very  particular 
that  I  require,  quite  out  of  the  common." 


252  FROM   THE   PORCH 

"  Just  so,"  says  Miss  Y .     "  I  won't  forget." 

"  Don't  forget,  and  you  won't  mention  the 
circumstances  to  any  one,"  says  the  other,  and 
exit  mysteriously  with  a  confidential  sign. 

Follows  a  smiling  little  creature,  with  large 
round  eyes. 

"  Well,"   said    Miss   Y ,   who    is  certainly 

untiring  in  sympathy  and  kindness,  "is  it  all 
right  ?     Are  you  engaged,  Polly  ? " 

"Please,  Miss,  I'm  much  too  short,"  says  the 
little  maiden. 

As  we  have  said,  it  is  not  only  the  district 
girls  who  apply  at  these  offices ;  all  the  young 
persons  of  the  neighbourhood  are  made  wel- 
come by  the  recording  angels  (so  they  seem 
to  me),  who  remember  their  names,  invite  them 
to  take  a  seat  on  the  bench,  produce  big 
books  with  their  histories,  necessities,  and 
qualifications  all  written  down,  and  by  the 
help  of  which  they  are  more  or  less  "  suited." 
Besides  a  mistress,  a  kitchen  to  scrub,  if 
they  behave  themselves  they  are  also  pre- 
sented with  a  badge  and  honourable  decora- 
tion, fastened  by  a  blue  ribbon,  and  eventually 
they   are  promoted  to   a    red    ribbon,   the   high 


{ 


UPSTAIRS   AND   DOWNSTAIRS     253 

badge  of  honour  for  these  young  warriors. 
And  though  some  people  may  smile,  it  is, 
when  we  come  to  think  of  it,  a  hardly  earned 
distinction,  well  deserved  as  any  soldier's  cross. 
What  a  campaign  for  them — a  daily  fight  with 
the  powers  of  darkness  and  ignorance,  with 
dust,  with  dirt,  with  disorder.  Where  should 
we  be  without  our  little  serving  girls?  At 
this  moment,  as  I  write  by  a  comfortable  fire, 
I  hear  the  sound  of  a  virtuous  and  matutinal 
broom  in  the  cold  passages  below,  and  I  reflect 
that  these  8000  little  beings  on  the  books 
are  hard  at  work  all  over  London  and  fight- 
ing chaos  in  the  foggy  twilight  of  a  winter's 
morning. 

It  is  a  hard  life  at  best  for  some  of  them ; 
so  hard  that  they  break  down  utterly  in  the 
struggle  with  temper  and  other  tempers,  with 
inexperience,  with  temptations  of  every  sort. 
If  one  thinks  of  it  one  can  imagine  it  all,  and 
the  impatience,  and  the  petty  deceptions,  and 
the  childish  longings,  almost  irresistible,  one 
might  think,  to  little  waifs  who  have  no  one 
to  look  to  for  praise  if  they  are  good,  or  for 
blame    if  they  are  naughty.      And  yet,  indeed, 


254  FROM   THE   PORCH 

they  are  not  ungrateful ;  they  respond  to  any 
word  of  real  friendship.  "  I  am  quite  frightened 
sometimes  to  find  how  much  they  think  of  my 
opinion,"  said  a  good  friend  the  other  day,  who 
has  for  some  years  past  worked  steadily  for  the 
Association.  "  They  make  me  quite  ashamed 
when  they  produce  my  wretched  little  notes 
out  of  their  pockets."  When  I  asked  this  lady 
about  the  children's  comparative  friendlessness, 
she  said  it  was  very  rare  to  find  them  absolutely 
alone,  but  that,  in  truth,  friends  are  often  far 
worse  enemies  than  loneliness.  They  come  and 
grasp  at  their  poor  little  earnings.  They  lead 
them  into  mischief  out  of  wanton  wickedness, 
and  desert  them  in  their  troubles.  A  girl  came 
staggering  into  her  office  not  long  ago,  so  ill 
that  she  could  hardly  stand.  She  had  gone  to 
her  sister,  whom  she  had  always  helped  with 
her  wages,  and  lain  in  bed  two  days  with 
fever,  and  then  her  sister  would  not  let  her 
stay,  and  turned  her  into  the  street,  though 
she  fell  twice  as  she  was  dressins^.  It  was  a 
case  of  smallpox,  and  the  poor  thing  was  sent 
off  to  the  Smallpox  Hospital.  "  I  went  to  see 
her  there,"  said  Miss  T ,  speaking  quite  as 


UPSTAIRS   AND   DOWNSTAIRS     255 

a  matter  of  course.  "  The  poor  child  began 
searching  under  her  pillow  and  showed  me  a 
little  scrap  of  a  note  I  had  written  her  a  year 
before,  which  she  had  carried  about  ever  since. 
One  can  scarcely  believe,"  the  kind  lady  said, 
"  how  they  prize  a  little  interest,  a  little 
friendly  intercourse  with  some  one  who  cares 
about  what  happens  to  them." 


IN    MY  LADY'S   CHAMBER 

I 

They  were  sitting  by  the  fire  one  evening  about 
Easter  time,  two  women,  to  whom  the  gloaming 
hours  made  little  difference,  except  that  the  lady 
of  the  house  poked  the  comfortable  embers  and 
shut  the  French  windows  of  the  room,  which  had 
been  open  to  a  twilight  garden,  where  narcissus 
and  blue  scilla  were  springing  and  fruit  trees 
were  coming  into  blossom,  and  whence  the  echoes 
of  Cambridge  clocks  and  chimes  reached  now  and 
again,  borne  across  wide  open  flats.  The  two 
ladies,  meeting  after  a  long  interval,  sat  talking 
over  the  time  which  had  passed,  comparing  the 
various  scraps  of  interest,  of  divination  of  feeling, 
which  belonged  in  common  to  them  both. 

One  of  them,  who  had  arrived  that  day, 
brought  with  her  a  varied  but  somewhat  tangled 
tune,  echoes  of  work,  of  diversion,  of  perplexity. 
The  home-keeping  friend's  light  seemed  to  play 
on  each  of  these  in  turn,  putting  new  meaning 


IN   MY   LADY'S   CHAMBER        257 

and  interpretations,  to  which    her   visitor    could 
only  respond  gratefully  and  not  without  admira- 
tion.   All  the  remembrance  of  things  past  seemed 
to  awaken  that  evening  and  to  come  back  into 
existence  more  vividly  every  moment  as  the  two, 
so  familiar  in  long-tried  affection — in  agreement 
and    in    divergence    also — held     their    peaceiul 
session  ;    almost  unconsciously  counting  up  the 
thens  and  the  nows,  the  things  they  cared  for 
and  those  they  had  hoped  for,  and  the  failures, 
as  well  as  the  facts  of  success  they  both  liked  to 
dwell  upon  with  that  sort  of  surprise  which   is 
even  greater,  perhaps,  in  success  than  that  which 
any  sense  of  failure  brings  with  it.     And  as  they 
recalled  efforts  which  had  succeeded,  the   lives 
which  to  the  end   had  ever  kept  to  their  high 
level,    counting    up    the    treasure-trove,    which 
belongs    to   us  all   indeed,  it  happened    that  in 
their    talk    they    came  to    the   mention    of  one 
name  among  others — that  of  Mrs.  Nassau  Senior 
— and  of  the    Association   which    will    ever    be 
linked  with  her  memory. 

Mrs.  Senior's  name  will  always  be  associated 
with  that  of  Mabys,  of  which  she  was  indeed  the 
founder,  feeling  as  she  did  the  want  of  some  such 

R 


258  FROM  THE   PORCH 

help  for  girls  coming  out  of  workhouse  schools 
and  asylums,  friendless  and  homeless,  leaving 
the  shelter  and  limitations  in  which  they  had 
been  brought  up  for  the  world,  where  rules  are 
not,  nor  safeguards,  and  the  results  were  often 
disastrous,  as  they  still  are  at  times. 

The  old  friends  looked  at  each  other  with  a 
common  feeling  of  pleasure  in  that  one  woman's 
achievements,  and  in  the  charm  of  a  personality 
still  present  after  a  quarter  of  a  century.  What 
follows  is  but  a  record  of  an  eveninsf's  talk. 

II 

We  could  almost  believe  now  and  again  as  we 
look  at  pictures  which  we  have  known  always 
that  mysterious  things  have  happened  to  them 
since  we  saw  them  first — that  new  expressions 
have  come  into  them.  Was  Turner's  "  Evening 
Star,"  for  instance,  as  brightly  scintillating  as 
now  when  the  painter  first  moved  away  from 
his  canvas,  or  has  the  silver  ocean,  travelling 
out  of  space,  come  into  the  picture  since  it  was 
first  painted?  It  is  not  so  with  some  lives  we 
have  loved  and  admired.  The  light  seems  to 
come  into  them. 


IN   MY   LADY'S  CHAMBER        259 

Many  of  us  may  have  this  impression  looking 
at  Watts's  fine  portrait  of  Mrs.  Nassau  Senior, 
so  famiUar  to  the  two  interlocutors  quoted  above. 
It  was  once  a  beautiful  picture  and  a  most 
charming  likeness,  but  now  it  seems  something 
more.  The  painter  had  the  spirit  of  divination, 
and  it  was  as  if  he  foresaw  and  remembered, 
too,  while  he  stood  painting  at  his  easel.  In 
this  particular  picture  he  has  not  only  given  us 
an  actual  portrait,  but  he  has  painted  an  abiding 
presence,  the  history  of  a  life.  The  lady  kneels 
to  reach  the  flowers ;  her  absorbed  and  careful 
looks  are  fixed  upon  the  lilies  which  she  is 
watering  ;  one  fair  hand  rests  upon  the  marble 
table,  the  other  with  rosy-tipped  fingers  holds 
up  the  glass  bowl  brimming  with  water.  Her 
violet  dress — how  well  it  always  became  her — 
hangs  in  straight  folds  from  her  waist ;  her 
beautiful  flood  of  yellow  hair  flows  in  ripples. 
Everything  in  the  painting  is  warm  in  tone ; 
it  is  all  simple,  yet  gorgeous  ;  so  is  the  ancient 
Indian  shawl  of  orange  and  blue  and  scarlet,  so 
is  the  big  chair  which  is  covered  with  Turkey 
twill ;    the  green  walls  are    only  papered   with 

ordinary    hangings ;     but    the    various    colours 

R  2 


260  FROM   THE   POECH 

vibrate  round  the  sweet  head,  which  is  bending" 
with  exquisite  concern  and  intentness,  and  which 
is  the  soul  of  it  all.  A  tray  of  hothouse  flowers 
stands  waiting  on  the  floor.  There  are  sprays 
of  azalea  and  crown-imperials,  and  geraniums 
and  maiden-hair  ferns  ;  but  the  lady  has  left 
them  to  water  the  growing  lilies,  and  the  feeling 
of  peaceful  ministry  and  the  warmth  of  generous 
existence,  all  are  somehow  told  in  the  picture,  as 
it  was  in  the  life  itself,  which  ended  so  long  ago^ 
which  is  so  beneficent  still. 

Watts  himself  has  written  of  this  picture, 
of  the  intention  he  had  when  he  created  it, 
making  her,  as  he  says,  "water  a  flowering  root 
with  so  much  solicitude  "  ;  and  he  goes  on  to  dwell 
upon  "the  aspirations  and  affections  which  are 
sometimes  with  difficulty  kept  alive  in  the  crush 
of  artificial  society.  I  love,"  he  writes  in  a  letter 
to  her,  "  to  think  of  you  cultivating  these  rare 
roots.  .  .  .  No,  not  rare  : 

"  '  By  God's  dear  grace  not  rare  ; 

In  many  a  lonely  homestead  blooming  strong.'  " 

...  As  I  quote  from  Watts's  letter  I  cannot  help 
also  remembering  a  saying  of  Ruskin,  in  which 


IN   MY   LADY'S   CHAMBER        261 

he,  too,  dwells  on  a  woman's  vocation.  "  A  true 
lady,"  Ruskin  says,  "should  be  a  princess,  a 
washerwoman — yes,  a  washerwoman,  to  wash 
with  water,  to  cleanse,  to  purify  wherever  she 
goes,  to  set  disordered  things  in  orderly  array, 
.  .  .  This  is  a  woman's  mission." 

Ill 

Some  of  us  may  still  remember  Elm  House, 
where  the  Seniors  lived  at  Wandsworth,  and 
the  long,  low  drawing-room,  with  its  big  bow- 
window  opening  to  a  garden  full  of  gay  parterres, 
where  lawns  ran  to  the  distant  boundary,  while 
beyond  again  lay  a  far-away  horizon.  It  was 
not  the  sea  that  one  saw  spreading  before  one's 
eyes,  but  the  vast  plateau  of  London,  with  its 
drifting  vapours  and  its  ripple  of  housetops  flow- 
ing to  meet  the  sky-line.  The  room  itself  was 
pleasant,  sunny,  and  well-worn.  There  were  old 
rugs  spread  on  the  stained  floors  (they  were  not 
as  yet  in  fashion  as  they  are  now) ;  many  pictures 
w^ere  hanging  on  the  walls ;  a  varied  gallery, 
good  and  indiflierent ;  among  the  good  were  one 
or  two  of  Watts's  finest  portraits,  and  I  can  also 
remember  a  Madonna's  head  with  a  heavy  blue 


262  FEOM   THE   PORCH 

veil,  and  in  juxtaposition  a  Pompeian  sort  of 
ballet  girl,  almost  springing  from  the  frame ; 
and  then,  besides  the  pictures,  there  was  a  sense 
of  music  in  the  air,  and  of  flowers,  and  of 
more  flowers.  The  long  piano  was  piled  with 
music-books.  Mrs.  Nassau  Senior,  the  mistress 
of  the  house,  used  to  play  her  own  chords  and 
accompany  herself  as  she  poured  out  her  full 
heart  in  strains  beautiful  and  measured  rather 
than  profuse. 

Garcia  had  been  Mrs.  Senior's  singing  master, 
and  he  would  sometimes  be  present  among  the 
rest.  I  heard  him  speaking  of  her  with  aflec- 
tionate  admiration  when  he  was  a  hundred  years 
old,  in  his  honourable  age.  How  clear  was  her 
voice,  how  it  rang  and  vibrated !  For  those 
who  loved  to  listen  to  it,  her  "  Vado  ben  spesso  " 
rings  on  still.  The  true  notes  flowed ;  she  did 
not  seem  to  make  any  eflbrt.  She  would  cease 
singing  to  make  some  old  friend  welcome,  and 
take  to  her  music  ap-ain  as  a  matter  of  course. 
There  was  no  solemnity  in  her  performance,  and 
yet  I  have  heard  Mrs.  Sartoris  ^  say  that  it  was 

^  Mrs.  Sartoris — Adelaide  Kemble — has  given  a  charming  account 
of  Mrs.  Senior  in  her  Reflections  of  Joseph  Heywood,  under  the  name 
of  "  Christian  Kupert." 


IN   MY   LADY'S   CHAMBER        263 

because  of  the  unremitting  work  of  years,  and 
because  of  Mrs.  Senior's  devotion  to  her  art  with 
absolute  and  conscientious  determination,  that 
she  could  use  her  voice  as  she  did  with  tender 
and  brilliant  ease.  It  was  a  good  sword  indeed 
to  defend  the  right.  I  heard  a  pretty  story  of 
a  room  full  of  Whitechapel  boys  and  girls  in 
revolt,  and  suddenly,  when  the  clamour  was 
at  its  height,  she  stood  up  quietly  and  began 
to  sing,  and  the  storm  stopped  and  the  room  be- 
came silent  and  attentive.  Sir  Theodore  Martin 
told  me  that  he  had  only  met  Mrs.  Senior  once, 
one  day  when  she  was  singing  an  Irish  ballad  to 
George  Eliot  at  North  Bank,  "  Far  from  the 
land  where  her  young  hero  sleeps,"  which  was 
written  of  Emmet.  Sir  Theodore  said  that  forty 
years  after  he  "  could  hear  the  notes  still  quite 
plainly."  Some  voices  have  this  peculiar  quality 
of  vibrating  on  and  on. 

Stately  and  charming  people  used  to  assemble 
at  Elm  House.  It  is  an  old  saying  that  people 
of  a  certain  stamp  attract  each  other.  It  was 
a  really  remarkable  assemblage  of  accomplished 
and  beautiful  women  who  were  in  the  habit  of 
coming  there,  that  home  so  bare,  so  simple,  and 


264  FEOM   THE   POECH 

yet  so  luxurious.  It  was  like  a  foreign  colony. 
The  old  roof  held  father,  mother,  son,  the  two 
widowed  grandmothers — each  in  her  own  rooms, 
with  her  own  attendant  and  the  consequent 
vibrations.  There  was  a  younger  brother  ^  also, 
with  his  flock  of  motherless  children.  The 
servants  were  like  friends,  not  servants. 

There  is  a  letter  with  a  date  to  it,  February 
1874,  written  by  Mrs.  Senior  from  a  little  cottage 
in  the  Isle  of  Wight  which  Mrs.  Cameron  had 
lately  altered  and  devised,  and  which  has  be- 
longed to  the  writer  at  intervals  for  years. 
That  one  winter  Mrs.  Senior  went  there  to  stay 
in  it.  Her  son  has  let  me  see  the  letter,  which 
begins  with  a  motherly  blessing,  then  con- 
tinues : 

"My  dear,  this  is  the  Porch,  the  gate  of 
Heaven.  There  is  a  sense  of  repose  that  I  think 
one  must  feel  just  after  death  before  beginning 
the  new  life.  It  is  inconceivable  how  I  enjoy  it. 
I  do  nothing  for  hours  together.  The  sitting- 
room  opens  into  a  tiny  conservatory,  and  through 
the  open  window  one  hears  the  enchanted  moan 

1  H.  H.,  now  gone  to  his  rest,  after  making  a  new  home  in  a 
new  world. 


rill-:  I'okTii 


IN   MY   LADY'S   CHAMBER        265 

of  the  sea  and  the  song  of  the  birds.  We 
are  a  long  way  from  the  sea,  but  I  hear  it ;  I 
wake  at  six  and  hear  the  earHest  pipe  of  half- 
awakened  birds,  and  I  go  to  sleep  with  the  sea 
in  my  ears  and  a  lovely  star  looking  in  at  my 
window.  .  .  .  We  are  to  lunch  at  the  Prinseps' 
to-morrow,  as  I  want  to  see  Watts.  He  is  going 
to  London  to  paint  portraits.  His  house  is  per- 
fectly charming.  I  am  dying  to  build  a  house. 
It  has  rained  all  this  morning,  and  we  could  not 
go  to  church ;  now  it  seems  clearing,  and  the 
sun  thinks  of  shining  ...  a  constant  thanks- 
giving and  prayer  goes  up  from  my  heart  as  I 
rest  and  am  thankful." 

What  a  grace  is  rest  to  those  who  work 
without  ceasing ! 

There  is  a  description  of  an  evening  at  Far- 
ringford  and  of  the  mysterious  walk  there — the 
veiled  stars  and  the  dark  garden  with  its  great 
shrubs  and  the  great  room  and  the  poet  within, 
reading,  and  Lady  Tennyson,  like  St.  Monica, 
lying  on  her  couch.  All  this  was  but  a  short 
break  in  the  constant  unending  work  of  Jeanie 
Senior's  life,  in  her  gallant  fight  with  suffering. 
During  the  first  week  of  this  holiday  she  could 


266  FEOM   THE   PORCH 

not  forget,  she  could  not  rest,  but  after  her  three 
weeks  she  writes  to  her  son  :  "I  feel  perfectly 
up  to  my  work  now,  and  have  fits  of  longing  to 
be  at  Paupers  again,  though  in  general  I  am 
absorbed  by  the  delight  of  the  beauty  of  every- 
thing, and  the  desire  to  pass  the  remaining 
years  of  my  life  in  painting  scenes  in  the  Isle 
of  Wight!  ..." 

She  describes  a  visit  she  paid  with  Mr.  Watts 
to  a  cottage  her  mother,  Mrs.  Hughes,  eventually 
bought : 

"  The  garden  was  most  sunny  and  warm,  and 
the  view  of  the  heath  and  the  sea  really 
lovely.  There  was  a  high  north  wind,  and 
the  colour  of  the  sea  light  green  and  purple, 
with  splendid  white  tops  to  the  waves.  The  bit 
of  heath,  too,  is  lovely,  but  there  is  no  field  for 
a  cow,  which  would  be  a  drawback  in  mother's 
eyes." 

Some  other  painter  should  have  been  there 
to  paint  the  two  figures  looking  across  the  gorse 
common  at  the  white  crests  of  the  waves.  Watts 
with  his  serene  and  stately  looks,  the  lady,  who 
had  but  such  a  little  while  to  live,  but  who  to 
the  last  tried  for  practical  beauty  in  life  as  far  as 


IN   MY   LADY'S   CHAMBER        267 

in  her  lay,  and  happiness  and  deliverance  from 
evil  for  others.  And  among  all  her  good  practical 
works  the  Metropolitan  Association  for  Befriend- 
ing Young  Servants  has  been  one  to  last  and 
to  spread  its  useful  harvest  under  the  care  of 
those  who  have  come  after  her.  Mabys  perhaps 
sprang  from  the  foam  of  those  waves  that  day 
as  they  broke  upon  Col  well  Bay. 


THE   END 


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